
Glass 



B Si i? i 



Copyright }1°_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 




9C1, BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH CO. 



Time's First Morning 



Garden Spots 

IN 

The Old Testament 



'Thou shalt be like a watered garden, 
like a spring whose waters fail not." 



BY 

REV. J. PRESSLEY BARRETT, D.D., 

Author of "Facing The Truth", "Fruit- Bearing 

Truths", "Centennial of Religious Journalism", 

"Modern Light- Bearers", "Camping 

Along The Master's Trail", and 

"Forty Years on the Firing Line" 



DAYTON, OHIO 

The CHRISTIAN PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION 

1915 



^ 



c- 

^ 



V 



DEDICATION 

To Father and Mother, 
John and Mary Barrett, 
who so truly and faithful- 
ly directed their children 
in the ways of right living, 
and who, though long since 
gone to their eternal home, 
are none the less grateful- 
ly and. affectionately re- 
raemhered by the 
AUTHOR, 




Copyright, 1915, by 

The Christian Publishing Association, 

Dayton, Ohio. 

DEC 30 1915 

©CI,A420134 



GARDEN SPOTS. 

I. The Story of Time's First Morn- 
ing 9 

II. A Wonderful Garden Story 21 

III. Fussing Over Cleaning Out Old 
Wells 33 

IV. Sounding the Key-note of the 

Christian Life 47 

V. Hiding in a Cleft of the Rock . . 63 

VI. Crossing the Brook at Sunrise. . 79 

VII. No Cradle Rocking in the Pulpit 93 

VIII. A Revolution Extraordinary .... Ill 

IX. A Miraculous Mode of Communi- 
cation 125 

X. The Believer's Unseen Body- 
guard 141 

XI. God Bids Hezekiah Good-bye .... 153 

XII. Covered With Silver and Gold. . 169 

XIII. Without Visions of Truth the 
People Perish 183 

XIV. Wait— It Will Surely Come 199 

XV. A Fourfold View of Christ and 
His Church as Foreshadowed in 
Old Testament Parables 215 



BY THE GARDEN GATE. 

When I was a boy, living on the farm in 
Virginia, we richly fertilized small plats of 
ground for gardening — we called them "garden 
spots/' Ordinary soil was good enough for 
corn and cotton, but for vegetables, small 
fruits, and flowers, we must have soil of 
extraordinary richness. To this day — fifty 
years later — the fertility of these "spots" 
abides. 

This is a little parable, intimating the rela- 
tion of the believer to his Bible — the great 
Book is adapted to the needs of Christians, 
but within its lids are many rich spots, all 
abloom with truth, exhaling the sweetness of 
heaven on earth. Around these we linger and 
feast. We are told that the Bible has 32,000 
promises — oases of blessing, along the pilgrim 
way. We can present only a few of these 
in this book, but enough we trust to stimulate 
the hungry to search the Bible for larger sup- 
plies of soul-food. 

Modern scholars think the old Bible writers 
were ignorant of astronomy and other sciences, 
and they may have been, except when they 
were under divine illumination from above. 
Hipparchus, 150 years before Christ, said he 
had counted the stars — that there were only 
1,022. Ptolemy, who lived in the second cen- 
tury after Christ, differed from Hipparchus, 



saying there were 1,026 stars in the midnight 
sky. Jeremiah, who lived more than 600 years 
before Christ, knew more than these men. He 
said ^^the hosts (stars) of heaven were innum- 
erable." See Jer. 33:22. No doubt Hippar- 
chus and Ptolemy said that Jeremiah's was 
one of the mistakes of inspiration, but when 
Galileo turned the telescope about 1,500 years 
later on the heavens, then for the first time 
men began to grasp the truth that Jeremiah 
was right when he compared the countless 
stars with the sands of the seashore. In the 
early part of the nineteenth century, when 
Lord Rosse trained the great mirror of his 
telescope upon the sky at night, its first sweep 
of the heavens revealed the presence of 400, 
000,000 stars in the sky. Herschel was so 
astonished that he called the great multitude 
"glittering dust, scattered on the black back- 
ground of the heavens." Who taught Jeremiah 
the science of astronomy, so long before that 
science was known to astronomers themselves? 
Jeremiah's teacher, the Lord, was far ahead 
of the scientists, and withal far more accurate. 
He was not mistaken, but the scientists were. 
Oh, let us cling to the old Book to the end — 
it is God's thought-granary, from which He 
feeds His people on the Bread of Heaven. 

"Holy Bible, Book Divine, 
Precious treasure, thou art mine !" 

J. P. B. 

Dayton, Ohio, Dec. 1, 1915. 



Last eve I paused beside a blacksmith* s 
door, 
And heard the anvil ring the vesper 
chime; 
Then, looking in, I saw upon the floor, 
Old hammers worn with beating, 
years of time. 

''How many anvils have you had?'' 
said I, 
''To wear and batter all these ham- 
mers so?" 
"Just one," said he, and then with 
twinkling eye, 
"The anvil wears the hammers out, 
you know" 

"And so," I thought, "The Anvil of 

God's Word 
For ages skeptic blows have beat 

upon. 
Yet, though the noise of falling blows 

was heard. 
The Anvil is unharmed, the hammer's 

GONE/^ 

— Anonymous. 



THE STORY OF TIME'S FIRST 
MORNING. 

"Twilight is the foregleam of coming glory." 

If you were standing in the great 
Yerkes Observatory at Lake Geneva, you 
might see the operator, sitting quietly 
in his chair. He has the great telescope 
so under his control that he seems to be 
doing almost nothing. Observe the 
movement of his hand. He touches a 
button, and the huge dome begins to 
revolve. He touches another button, 
and the whole floor rises noiselessly. He 
touches still another, and the gigantic 
tube begins to turn slowly till it points 
to a star in the heavens. The operator 
touches another button and sets a clock 
to work in conformity to the apparent 
movement of the star. One mind is 
directing the whole affair! How won- 
derful, and yet how simple to as many 
as understand the science of astronomy ! 
This is but an insignificant picture of 
another, and a far greater work 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

wrought by One who was and is able to 
do exceedingly abundantly above all 
that we ask or think. 

Imparting Life 

In Gen. 1 : 2, we read — 

"And the Spirit of God moved (brooded) 
upon the face of the waters." 

The creative act of God had thrown 
a great mass of chaotic matter into 
space — it was void, without form, with- 
out life, and without beauty — a mere 
fruitless existence, floating in darkness, 
and apparently without a purpose. This 
is the beginning of what is now the 
earth, and to us the world in which 
we live, so full of life and beauty and 
blessing. 

We are told that the Spirit of God 
moved, or brooded, upon the waters. Do 
you get the thought? The mother hen 
broods over her eggs till she has 
imparted her own life to them and has 
brought forth new life in her young. 
This graphically portrays the real idea 
of the Spirit brooding over the waters. 
As the patient brooding of the mother 
hen brings forth new life, so the brood- 

10 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

ing of the Spirit over this mass of 
chaotic matter imparted life to this 
beginning of creation in a most wonder- 
ful way, unfolding the greatest pano- 
rama upon which men have ever looked, 
and the work is yet in process, unfold- 
ing the glories of the heavens and the 
earth. As the sunshine gives growth 
to vegetation and brings forth the fruit, 
so the Spirit in the divine life fashions 
us after the life of Christ. 

Changes Wrought 

Let us look upon the scene as it 
developed in the beginning. As the 
brooding of the Spirit imparted life to 
this mass of matter in chaos, results 
began to come as follows : 

Light flashed upon the darkness of the 
earth. 

Light separated, or drove the dark- 
ness away. 

The firmament in its beauty and glory 
came forth and the waters were divided 
from the waters — above and below the 
firmament. 

The waters were separated from the 

land. 
11 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

The earth was fructified and yielded a 
marvelous fruitage to meet the needs of 
the forthcoming human family. 

The sea was fructified, being made to 
abound in precious stones and living 
creatures for the use of man. 

Man was brought forth, last, but not 
least, in the creation, being richly 
endowed with rare physical, intellectual, 
moral, and spiritual gifts from the hand 
of the Creator. 

The Idea Illustrated 

In all of these beneficent acts of God, 
we behold a very marked illustration. 
The work of the Spirit upon the mate- 
rial matter, giving it life, utility, and 
beauty, is prophetic of what He will do 
in the development and fruitfulness of 
man. This work of the Spirit but 
illustrates His work in giving life to 
man, in developing his moral and spirit- 
ual character, restoring to man his 
likeness to God. 

Let us see if this is correct. In what 
sense is there a likeness between matter 
in chaos and man in sin ? 

12 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Matter had a simple existence, with- 
out life, without form, without beauty, 
and without fruitfulness. So man was 
dead in trespasses and in sin, having not 
the fear of God before him. 

As matter had existence, but not 
life, so the unregenerate man has an 
existence, but not the life of God — he is 
void and empty, not at all occupied with 
the thoughts of God, but delighting in 
sin. 

Without Life: Without Light 

Matter existed without life and with- 
out light. So did man. He may enjoy 
human wisdom, but in sin he knows 
nothing of the true light of God. As 
the Spirit found the world void and 
empty, giving no glory to God, so the 
same Spirit finds unrenewed man 
enveloped in darkness and dead in sin, 
not at all concerned for the glory of 
God. 

Out of that chaotic matter the Spirit 
has made this beautiful and fruit- 
ful world, filling it with wealth and 
untold blessing. In this He reveals to 
us what He can do for man, redeemed 

13 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

from sin and made a member of the 
family of God — endowing him with rare 
and high gifts and imparting to him the 
very life of God, till lifted out of sin, he 
shall be restored to his Adamic beauty 
and given the largest field of usefulness 
in the service of God. He put the 
chaotic matter at its best, making it 
beautiful and fruitful. Shall we believe 
that the Spirit will do less for us, being 
created in the likeness of God, but 
cheated out of it by the cunning of 
Satan? Shall we not share as largely 
in the Spirit's bounty, we who have 
been made in the likeness of the Creator 
Himself, as did the mass of chaotic 
matter of which the Spirit has made 
this beautiful world, filled with the 
bounty of the seas, the wealth of the 
earth, and the glory of the heavens — 
will He do less for man than He did 
for this' mass of unformed matter that 
cannot share in the bliss of eternal life? 
Nay, God has redeemed man and called 
him to a larger and a higher life, in 
which he may become a worker together 
with God, and to life in Christ. 

14 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 
Parallelism in the Work of the Spirit 

The work of the Spirit in the physical 
world is surpassed only by His work in 
the realms of spiritual life. We may 
trace the parallelism of the Spirit's 
work in the two spheres. 

In the physical world the Spirit first 
gave light to drive away darkness. 
What He did for matter He may do for 
man. Then He imparted life and made 
the world fruitful. Even so in the 
spiritual life, man is given light which 
brings in him conviction of sin and 
repentance. In this separation justifi- 
cation is God's gift, which prepares man 
for this new life in Christ. With the 
gift of the regenerated life comes the 
making of the inner life fruitful and 
the bestowment of power for service. 
This leads to the consecration of the life 
to God, in which are developed all the 
graces of the Spirit, reaching full 
fruition. 

Thus the chaos of matter was organ- 
ized, given shape and beauty, and made 
fruitful. So the life of man, redeemed 
by Jesus Christ, is wonderfully saved 

15 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

and made the servant of God. Spir- 
itually speaking, the unsaved mar- is a 
chaotic mass, without the life of God, 
without beauty, without light, without 
f ruitf ulness ; in God's sight a mere mass 
of worthlessness. The life thus saved 
becomes, under the brooding of the 
Spirit, the beautiful, the illuminated, 
the enriched, the finished temple of God. 
Under the gift and work of the Spirit 
the life of man has been fitly shaped and 
fashioned till it has become a habitation 
of God through the Spirit (Eph. 2: 19- 
22). A wonderful thought, indeed! 

God's Willingness 

As we see it, God worked in the 
creation of the world His wonders 
through the Spirit, giving light and 
shape, beauty and finish, power and 
fruitfulness, that He might convince 
fallen man of His willingness and 
ability to do the greater thing of rescu- 
ing man from sin and bringing his life 
back into harmony with the Creator. 
If God, through the Spirit, could do the 
one. He most certainly can do the other 
— He most certainly has done it, and will 

16 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

do it again, day by day, till the last 
believing and trusting soul has been 
lifted from the depths of sin to the 
heights of life in Christ Jesus. If you 
desire a picture of what we shall be, 
when we have been transfornied fully 
by grace and made like Christ, then look 
at the mass of dead matter, without 
shape and without beauty ; without 
power and without fruitfulness, as it 
lay out in the darkness of the beginning, 
and then turn and look at the beautiful 
world in which you are now living, so 
full of every good thing. The former 
was developed into the latter by the 
brooding of the Spirit. Think of that 
and then think of yourself as dead in 
trespasses and sins, without God and 
without hope in the world, and be 
assured of the ever-living fact that God 
has made us a thousand times more 
precious than material matter, and 
therefore there can be no doubt that He 
will do infinitely more for our salvation 
and perfection in Christ, than He ever 

17 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

did for nature. With such a view before 
us, no passing cloud should obscure the 
sun of our joy and hope in Christ. 

''All Thy works with joy surround Thee, 

Earth and Heaven reflect Thy rays, 
Stars and angels sing around Thee — 

Center of unbroken praise! 
Field and forest, valley and mountain. 

Blooming meadow, flashing sea, 
Chanting bird and flowing fountain, 

Call us to rejoice in Thee." 



18 



pS!^f 



J-'^.=^« <ft ■^$^->^^ 



^^t^.M^l^ ^^^^^: 




?ICHT, 1901, BY 



IDENCE LITHOGR. 



God's Covenant With Noah 



Self-indulgence is the besetting sin of 
the times; but if you long to be a strong, 
athletic Christian, you must count the 
cost and renounce the things of the 
flesh. It will cost you the pulling up of 
some old favorite sins by the roots and 
the cutting loose from some entangling 
alliances, and some sharp conflicts with 
the tempVer; it will cost you the sub- 
mitting of your will to the will of 
Christ; but you gain more than you ever 
gave up. — Theodore L. Cuyler. 



A WONDERFUL GARDEN STORY. 

"In the garden of the heart God's flowers 
grow." 

Around the word garden cluster many 
beautiful ideas. Every land and every 
language has added to the scope of the 
meaning of the word, till it is associated 
with rich beauty and rare fragrance. 
The garden is a productive spot. Its 
flowers are beautiful, and its fruits are 
rich. 

"Thus beauty here is like to that above, 
And loveliness leads up to perfect love." 

Men have spent time and money try- 
ing to locate the exact spot of the Gar- 
den in Eden, to describe its situation, 
to determine its fruits, and to learn its 
full history. It might be well to learn 
these things, but something else is more 
timely and far more valuable to God's 
people, viz. : To search out and know 
its significance in human history — what 
it means in the thought of God and what 
it means for us. 

21 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

If we may be so fortunate as to make 
this discovery, we shall be more highly 
blessed than all those who have claimed 
to determine the location of the -garden, 
its fruits and its wealth. Let us begin 
at the beginning and so seek in a simple 
way to ascertain its meaning. The first 
words concerning it we find in Gen. 
2:8— 

"And the Lord God planted a garden east- 
ward in Eden; and there He put the man 
whom He had formed." 

Placed by the Lord 

As the creative hand of God made one 
thing after another. He put each in the 
place for which it had been made. The 
planting of this garden was a part of 
the creative plan. Man was placed in it 
to serve a high and holy purpose. 

Then may we ask, What was the Gar- 
den in Eden? Attempts to answer that 
question have awakened much contro- 
versy. We call it the Garden of Eden, 
but the Bible calls it the Garden in 
Eden. Our task is not so much to dis- 
cover what the Garden in Eden was, as 
what is its meaning to us. To do that, 
we must find the key-thought, and that 

22 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

I think we may find in verse nine of 
chapter two, which reads: 

^*And out of the ground made the Lord God 
to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, 
and good for food ; the tree of life also in the 
midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge 
of good and evil." 

The Significance of the Tree of Life 

Beyond all question the Tree of Life 
had a spiritual significance. If this be 
true, and we believe it is, then we have 
caught the thread which may lead us 
to the fountain-head and to a full expla- 
nation, not so much of what the Gar- 
den in Eden was, as what its meaning 
is — now as then. If the tree of knowl- 
edge of good and evil is spiritual in 
character, then we may safely conclude 
that the garden is a symbol of the 
Church in the world. 

One essential fact of the garden was 
its productiveness. This seems to have 
been its chief characteristic. It pro- 
duced every tree and fruit and flower 
that could contribute to the comfort of 
man and to his pleasure. Symbolically 
this is a beautiful setting forth of God's 
conception of what His Church should 

23 



CxARDEN SPOTS IN 

be to the human family — productive of 
nourishment for the spiritual life of 
man. He likens His Church to a garden 
because the language describing it and 
the thought it presents can be easily 
and readily understood by men and 
women. 

The first thing to attract our atten- 
tion among the trees of the garden is 
the Tree of Life, Near by was the tree of 
the knowledge of good and evil, and then 
scattered around were all manner of 
trees, each bearing its fruits in its sea- 
son. And what is the Tree of Life? It 
is the source of all life. To this thought 
one explanation seems sufficient — the 
Tree of Life is the symbolof God. As 
this tree was in the midst of the garden, 
so God has declared that He dwells in 
the midst of His people. Zech. 2 : 10, 11. 

The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil 

And what is this tree? It is Divine 
Truth, likened to a tree, bearing the 
virtues and graces of the divine life. To 
eat of these would be to make one wise, 
but this wisdom would expose its pos- 
sessor to sin and death. It was to save 

24 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

man from such a calamity that God 
gave the command : 

"Ye shall not eat of the tree of knowledge 
of good and evil.'' 

Not to eat of that tree meant inno- 
cency and freedom from moral respon- 
sibility. To eat of it meant an open 
way to knowledge, and to sin and death. 
The beasts of the field did not eat of 
it, and they remain innocent to this day, 
but man ate of it and came to know 
good and evil, and sinned. In the day 
he sinned, he died to God and holiness. 
It was in this moment of spiritual 
calamity that God offered to redeem 
man from the curse of sin. In the face 
of sin, God's goodness gave man 
another chance, the right to choose 
between right and wrong, opening the 
way to life in Christ. Though man had 
fallen in the way of death, yet God 
turned him into the way of life. Is it 
not a thousand times better to suffer 
from sin with the privilege to be 
redeemed by the blood of Christ, being 
made heirs of God and joint-heirs with 
Christ to an everlasting inheritance 

25 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

that can never fade away, than to be 
as innocent as the beasts of the field, 
and with all as ignorant and helpless as 
they? Then was not sin a blessing to 
man? A thousand times, NO! It was 
a curse, but because of God's great love 
for man, He turned the curse into a 
blessing by giving man the privilege of 
salvation from sin through Christ. 
Having thus started man on the way to 
life. He assigned to him the duty of 
keeping and dressing the Garden in 
Eden, but keeping and dressing the 
garden would not make it fruitful. God 
met this lack in man's ability by send- 
ing forth a great river to water the 
garden. Gen. 2 : 10-14. 

"From the throne flows a wondrous stream, 
On its w^aters the love lights gleam; 
God the Father His mercy shows. 
By the river which ever flows. 
Flow on River of Eden, fair and bright. 
Ever bearing a message from the throne of 
light." 

Starting in Eden as one great river, 

it divided into four streams. This river 

is a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Its four 

branches indicate, as I think, the four- 

26 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

fold work of the Spirit of God in the 
Church. 

The first branch of the river was 
called PisoUy indicating that it was full 
and rushing. This characteristic of the 
Spirit appeared on the day of Pentecost. 
See Acts 2 : 2. 

The second branch of this river was 
called Gihon, indicating rapid move- 
ment; not merely power, but power 
filled with life. This characteristic 
appeared also on the day of Pentecost, 
when three thousand men and women 
v/ere saved in a single day under the 
power of the Holy Spirit. Acts 2 : 41. 

The third branch of this river was 
called Hiddekel, indicating the swift-fly- 
ing arrows of truth in the gospel age of 
salvation, as inaugurated on the day of 
Pentecost, when the power of the Holy 
Spirit came upon the multitudes, bring- 
ing them to repentance and life in 
Christ. See Acts 2 : 43, 44. 

The fourth river was called Euphra- 
tes, suggesting the fruitfulness the river 
would give to the garden, as indicated 
in Acts 2 : 46, 47. 

27 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 
The River Is a Symbol 

It is therefore clear that these rivers 
may symbolize the work of the Holy 
Spirit in this fourfold application. 
This is foreshadowed in John 7 : 37-39, 
where the work of the Spirit is likened 
to the outflowing of a river, enriching 
and giving great fruitfulness to all 
within its reach. It was so regarded 
long before its actual manifestation on 
the Day of Pentecost, as you may see 
by turning to Ezekiel 47, where the 
river flowing from under the house, 
eastward, by the south side of the altar, 
became a swelling stream flowing in 
great fulness, and rapidly, toward and 
through the Dead Sea, giving life to 
everything its waters touched. What a 
symbol of the Holy Spirit, flowing 
through the Church and giving power 
and fruitfulness to its life and its 
activities ! 

This great work was exemplified in 
the early Pentecost of the Church. Jeru- 
salem was a dry and thirsty land, 
giving forth practically no life nor 
fruit, but when it was watered as a gar- 

28 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

den by this fourfold river, then new life 
and rich fruitage were brought forth in 
abundance — a beautiful symbol of the 
Church of Christ, with the Holy Spirit, 
like a great river, sweeping through its 
every nook and corner, making it blos- 
som as the rose and fruit as the valley 
of Eschol. As this mighty spiritual 
river filled the Dead Sea with life, and 
sweeping through the valley of dry 
bones, made them to live again, so if 
God's people to-day could be persuaded 
to wait in ''the upper room" till 
the outpouring of this mighty river 
might be again given to the Church of 
Christ, again should we see the dead 
made alive and even the dry bones of 
a formal and stilted body of believers 
should be made to live again and in 
great power glorify God among men. If 
the professed Church is ever to be 
made alive in Christ, some means must 
be found by which she can be brought 
to realize her need of this mighty on- 
flowing river of the Spirit of God, and 
be induced to wait in "the upper room" 

29 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

till she receive her Pentecost, as did the 
early Church. 

The Garden in Eden a Prophecy 

We may not so certainly understand 
just what the Garden in Eden was, nor 
where it was located, but one thing 
seems quite sure, viz. : It is a prophecy 
and a picture of the Church of Christ, 
bearmg the precious fruits of the Spirit, 
being watered by the outflowing river 
of the Holy Ghost, marvelously adding 
to the glory of God in the full estab- 
lishment of the kingdom of Christ 
among men, and for their salvation. 

In God's Garden, the Church, watered 
by this River, which grows deeper and 
wider, as it flows, imparting life and 
thrift and fruitage to every plant, to 
every believer living in its stimulating 
waters — 

**The lily white that bloometh there is purity; 
The fragrant violet is surnamed humility; 
The lovely damask rose is here called patience ; 
The rich and cheerful marigold is obedience; 
But one there is that bears a crown the rest 

above, 
A crown imperial, and this flower is holy 

LOVE!" 



SO 




COPYRIGHT, 1901^ BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH CO- 
IN THE Garden 



'^It is not so much where you are as 
what you are that makes your heaven. 
The bright, cheery soul who lives the 
life of trust sees only the sunny side 
of everything, and has learned to 
endure cheerfully and with a bright 
face where everything looks dark/' 



FUSSING OVER CLEANING OUT 
OLD WELLS. 

"The mouth of a righteous man is a well 
of life." 

There are few things in family life 
more valuable than a good supply of 
pure water. In our country and day a 
good supply of water for family use is 
not highly prized, and for the reason 
that we have an abundance at our com- 
mand in any place we may go. It was 
not that way in the East, at least in 
some parts it was not. Water was 
scarce and hard to get. I heard a mis- 
sionary from Arabia once say when he 
came to the United States on a fur- 
lough, that every time he saw a person 
take a drink of water and then throw 
away what was left, he felt like saying : 
''Oh, don't do it!" In Arabia, he said, 
they would not throw away a drop if 
they could avoid it, because water was 
so scarce and so hard to get. 

This gives us some estimate of the 
value placed upon a good well in that 

33 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

country. Till this day they seek to save 
every water supply possible, and hence 
we read in Gen. 26 : 18 — 

^^And Isaac digged again the wells of water, 
which they had digged in the days of Abraham 
his father; for the Philistines had stopped 
them after the death of Abraham: and he 
called their names after the names by which 
his father had called them.'' 

The Work of An Enemy 

It was after the death of Abraham 
that the Philistines destroyed these 
wells, so that later when Isaac came to 
look after his father's property, he 
found no water. He began to hunt for 
the old wells which his father used, only 
to find that an enemy had filled them up 
and destroyed their value. This opened 
Isaac's eyes to the fact that his father's 
enemies were still abroad in the land. 

At once he began to open and to clean 
out the old wells for a water supply. He 
seemed never for a moment to have 
thought of any lack of property rights 
there, as it was his father's land, and 
therefore his father's wells. He put his 
men to work, cleaning out those old 
wells. The first one undertaken was 

84 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Esek, that was the name Abraham gave 
to the well in his day. Isaac still called 
it Esek. To his surprise, he had not 
completed the work of cleaning it out, 
when he found the herdmen of Gerar 
raising serious objections to his rights. 
They said it was theirs, and at once 
began to contend. Esek means strife. Do 
not forget that, as we may have need to 
remember it. 

The Principle of Non-Resistance 

What do you suppose Isaac did? 
Why, as strange as it may seem, he 
refused to contend with them and 
simply moved on to the next old well, 
and at once began to clean it out. The 
name of that well was Sitnah, meaning 
hatred. Isaac had not much more than 
got to work, in cleaning out Sitnah, 
before the herdmen of Gerar again 
appeared, objecting to his cleaning it out. 
Some people do not like to have things 
clean about them, anyway. These 
Gerarites seemed determined that Isaac 
should have no good water in that land. 
They simply held on and objected to his 
cleaning out Sitnah. 

35 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Again, we find Isaac a peace-lover, 

and so, rather than have a fuss over the 

well, he instructed his men to pull up 

and move on. He led the way and left 

Sitnah to his enemies, rather than strive 

against them. He soon came to another 

old well which had been the property 

of his father. Here he again began to 

clean out and make ready for using the 

water. This time, to his joy, the Gerar- 

ites did not bother him. Of course, he 

expected them, as they had striven 

against him at both Esek and Sitnah, 

but they did not come, and he called the 

name of the third well Rehoboth, for he 

said : 

"For now the Lord hath made room for us, 
and we shaU be fruitful in the land.'* 

But one well was not enough to meet 
his needs, and so he soon moved on to 
Beer-sheba, and there the Lord 
appeared to him and said: 

"I am the God of Abraham thy father: fear 
not, for I am with thee, and will bless thee, 
and multiply thy seed for my servant, Abra- 
ham's sake." 

36 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 
A Mark of God's Favor 

This was such a mark of God's pleas- 
ure in Isaac that at once he built an 
altar there and called upon the name of 
the Lord, and there he pitched his tent, 
and there the servants of Isaac began 
to dig a well. They felt that a brighter 
day was dawning upon them, especially 
as their enemies had quit following and 

contending against ihem. At last Isaac 
felt that he could settle down in peace 
and be happy. But it was with Isaac as 
it has been with many others, he was 
measuring his joy all too soon, for be- 
fore the well was completed, behold here 
came Abimelech and Phicol, the chief 
captain of his army. Of course, their 
appearance disturbed him not a little. 
He supposed they were intending to 
push him to some other place. Twice 
he had given up his wells for the sake 
of peace, and now they are coming 
again. He went out to meet them, and 
as they came together, Isaac said : 

"Wherefore come ye to me, seeing ye hate 
me, and have sent me away from you?'' 

37 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 
Greatly Surprised 

Their answer gave Isaac the surprise 
of his life, for Abimelech answered : 

"We saw certainly that the Lord was with 
thee: and we said, Let there be now an oath 
betwixt us and thee, and let us make a cove- 
nant with thee — That thou wilt do us no hurt, 
as we have not touched thee, and as we have 
done unto thee nothing but good, and have sent 
thee away in peace: thou art now the blessed 
of the Lord!'' 

Then they ate together, and the men 
were gone, and Isaac was feeling just 
fine, for his enemies had become his 
friends, having made a covenant with 
him to give him no more trouble. Just 
about the time the men left, Isaac's 
well-diggers came in and reported that 
they had ''found water," and they called 
the place Shebah, the well of an oath, 
referring possibly to the treaty Abim- 
elech made with Abraham on or near 
that spot almost a hundred years ago. 

This is a most interesting incident 
and it may be worth while to give time 
to its study. Let us first note the facts 
and then see what they teach us : 

Isaac, though living long before the 
time of Christ, yet possessed His Spirit 

38 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

— he would not contend for what might 
be his legal rights. Rather than con- 
tend, he moved on to look for another 
well, where he could get water, though 
in doing so, he suffered great incon- 
venience for himself and family, besides 
he lost all of the work his men had done 
in cleaning out the well. This had been 
twice repeated, but still Isaac's patience 
held out. 

Then the Lord rewarded him with a 
well without contention, and gave him 
great fruitfulness in all of his work, a 
very striking evidence that Isaac was 
not losing as much as on the surface he 
seemed to be. This is a great lesson for 
us all. When we please the Lord in 
dealing with our fellows, we are told 
that He makes even our enemies to be 
at peace with us. If we obey the Lord 
and maintain His Spirit, there is noth- 
ing left to the Lord but to make good 
His promises, and He will do it invari- 
ably. 

An Altar Unto the Lord 

In recognition of God's goodness to 
him, Isaac built an altar unto the Lord 

39 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

and his servants digged another well. 
As the king went out one way, Isaac's 
servants came in another, saying: 

"We have found water, and they called that 
wen Shebah." 

This incident gives us a sort of spir- 
itual diagram of the true conduct of a 
Christian under great provocation at 
the hand of an enemy, closing with 
blessing and victory for the man who 
conforms conscientiously to the Word 
of God. Notice how silent Isaac remained 
when Abimelech intimated that he 
needed this covenant to keep Isaac 
from hurting him (see verse 29). The 
truth is, Isaac had acted on the prin- 
ciple which Jesus later gave to the 
world, viz. : 

"But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: 
but whosoever shall smite you on the one cheek, 
turn to him the other also." 

Peace Methods Prevail 

Isaac did it, and Abimelech was com- 
pletely routed by peace methods, a far 
greater victory than if Isaac had mur- 
dered every one of them outright. How 
good if all Christians would thus act 

40 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

under trial at the hands of an enemy! 
With God's love as a real basis for such 
conduct, the last enemy of righteousness 
would flee, leaving us in full possession 
of our rights, with no one to molest or 
make us afraid. God's way is always 
the wise and good way ! 

Abraham's old wells were filled up by 
enemies. Isaac went bravely to work to 
clean them out. He worked by peace 
methods and gained a blessed victory — 
had more water than he knew need for 
— and God made his enemies to become 
his friends. How wonderful is the 
triumph of the right in its results ! 

In most of the Christian homes of 
to-day, no doubt, there are some wells 
which have been filled up. As sources of 
refreshing, a great loss has been sus- 
tained, and the need of the hour is to 
clean out those old wells, and so let the 
pure, living waters flow for the spirit- 
ual refreshing of the inmates and neigh- 
bors. Never mind as to enemies — God 
will take care of you. 

*'No matter what may be the test — 
God will take care of you; 
Lean, weary one, upon His breast — 
God will take care of you/' 

41 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

A Choked Heart Means no Service 
To-day many a heart is all choked up 
with the devil's debris. No service for 
God and the right — that is the result. 
Better imitate Isaac and get to work to 
clean out the old wells. 

There are the old wells of a once 
rich spiritual life in a loving heart, 
but now they are no longer use- 
ful, no longer refreshing — they are 
choked up! An enemy hath done 
this! Let us build an altar unto the 
Lord! Let us get to work and clean 
out the old well of love, now filled 
with malice, or choked up with ill-will 
or worldliness or vain ambitions — how 
filthy is the heart, if poisoned with these 
things ! No wonder God cannot use us in 
His service with our hearts filled with 
the devil's debris. Let us clean out and 
clean up, and give God a good, clean life, 
inside and out, in which His Spirit may 
dwell, and through which He may work, 
for the saving of the people and for the 
building up of His Church! Do your 
enemies hinder you ? Do as Isaac did — 
maintain the Spirit of Christ and clean 

42 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

out all these old wells and so give God a 
clean and beautiful and sweet life in 
which to live and work. Then, through 
you, He will silence your enemies, turn- 
ing their ways unto the Lord and win- 
ning the blessing and riches of grace 
both for yourself and for them. 

"Flow down, thou stream of life divine, 
Thy quickening love deliver; 
Oh, flow throughout this soul of mine — 
Forever and forever!" 



Let us commit ourselves to that 
unsleeping love and wisdom and power. 
He will go with us all the way through 
— not alone to the end of life, but to 
the end that lies beyond the end. There 
will be our final going out, our exodus, 
and our final coming in, our home-com- 
ing. And there is nothing that lies 
between you and the threshold of that 
heavenly home that need ever fill you 
with dismay if God be with you, — John 
McNeill. 




The Tabernacle 



Yes, the spirit and heart of anxiety \ 
is the denial for the time being, or the \ 
forgetting, of God. Therefore its cure, i 
our deliverance, comes with calling Him i 
to our remembrance, that is, with ■ 
prayer. What does one wish, when one i 
is harassed and anxious, but to feel that 
he and all that is really of value to him \ 
are in good hands, for they are in God's l 
hands ? And how can that feeling come l 
to me and stay with me when things \ 
seem contrary in the world and in my : 
lot, except by drawing near to God in j 
Jesus Christ, and bethinking myself I 
that He who spared not His own Son, \ 
but freely gave Him up for us all, will ; 
not fail us in our day of need, or, if He \ 
seem to fail us, it is that He is prepar- 
ing for us some greater good, and pre- 
paring us to receive it? — John A. \ 
Hutton. ^ 1 



SOUNDING THE KEY-NOTE OF 
THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

"As the Lord commanded, so did he." 
Is it hard to do that? It is 
and it is not. Paradoxical as that 
answer may seem to be, neverthe- 
less, it is true. Under the Spirit's 
power obedience is easy, but in 
man's strength it is difficult, if not 
impossible. Obedience is the foundation 
of both service and sacrifice. If a serv- 
ant obey not, his service will offend 
the master. Obedience is emphasized 
throughout the Scriptures. Even Noah, 
in building the ark and filling it with 
two of every kind, was most careful to 
follow instructions given him. In Gen. 
6 : 22, we read : 

"Thus did Noah; according to all that God 
commanded him; so did he." 

So this preacher of righteousness set 
the key-note of the obedient and conse- 
crated life. He was careful to do all of 
his work as God had commanded. We 
shall find the great leaders in the work 

47 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

of God were always careful to do the 
Lord's work as He had commanded. 
Abraham was true to the same key-note. 
In Gen. 12 : 4, it is written : 

"So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken 
to him." 

At first thought it might seem that 
Abraham's task was an easy one, but it 
was not. It required heroic faith to 
obey. God told him to get up and depart 
from his father's house and to go unto 
a land which the Lord would show him. 

Prompt Obedience 
Without hesitation and without com- 
plaint our hero obeyed and went out, 
not knowing whither he was going, only 
knowing that God had spoken and that 
he was obeying : 

"Faith is a grasping of Almighty power; 

The hand of man laid on the arm of God — 

The grand and blessed hour in which the 

things impossible to me 
Become the possible, Lord, through Thee." 

Again, as if Abram had not been fully 

tested, the Lord gave him another call, 

more trying even than the first — it was 

a call to offer up his son, Isaac, but 

having learned obedience in the begin- 

48 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

ning, he found it comparatively easy to 
offer his son. In Genesis 22 : 3, we read : 

"And Abraham arose up early in the morn- 
ing and went into a place of which God 

had told him and there made ready to offer 
his only son/^ 

This was the climax test of his faith, 
but he did not falter till God bade him 
stay his hand. Thus through exact 
obedience Abraham has become the hero 
of faith to all the ages following his day. 

But the trial of Abraham's faith was 
not sufficient for the trial of faith in the 
ages to follow, and so we find that the 
great leaders among the people of God 
have been tested each in his own day. 

The Artisan Must Obey 

In Exodus 36 : 1, we see this same 
exact obedience was required not only 
of leaders, but of laborers as well, as 
when we read : 

"Then wrought Bezaleel and Aholiab, and 
every wise hearted man, in whom the Lord 
put wisdom and understanding to know how 
to work all manner of work for the service of 
the sanctuary, according to all that the Lord 
had commanded." 

Here we see two men engaged in 
building the tabernacle — doing the man- 

49 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

ual work — and we observe that they are 
just as careful to do their work as God 
had commanded them, as had been Noah 
and Abraham in their labors. From 
this we get the thought that all kinds of 
work that are good and serviceable to 
men should be done as the Lord has 
commanded it. 

Moses Was Careful to Obey 

Again we find Moses, the great law- 
giver, was just as careful to do his work 
as the Lord commanded as were any 
others already mentioned. In Exodus 
40 : 16, we read : 

"Thus did Moses: according to all that the 
Lord commanded him, so did he." 

We are thus brought face to face with 
the care with which these servants did 
the work to which God had called them. 
Moses displays great anxiety in making 
his report as to how he had built the 
tabernacle. For at least eight times 
within a few verses he stops to say that 
he did the work as the Lord had com- 
manded him. Thus showing that Moses 
felt that God's approval and blessing 

50 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

upon his work depended upon an 
exact conformity to the directions which 
God had given him, and so, as he 
reported to the Lord the various stages 
of the work, he stopped and emphasized 
the fact that he had done it as the Lord 
had commanded. Not only did the Lord 
ask for exact obedience on the part of 
leaders and skilled workmen, but of the 
masses, for in Numbers 9 : 23 we read : 

*'At the commandment of the Lord they 
rested in the tents, and at the commandment 
of the Lord they journeyed: they kept the 
charge of the Lord, at the commandment of 
the Lord by the hand of Moses.'' 

A Chosen Leader 

Here we learn also that God often 
speaks to the masses through a chosen 
leader, as He did in this case through 
Moses. Notwithstanding the command 
was given at second hand, the children 
of Israel were very careful to rest when 
God said rest, and to journey when He 
said journey. 

We get another remarkable instance 
of God commanding even a leader 
through another leader. In Joshua 
il : 15 it is said: 

51 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

*'As the Lord commanded Moses his servant, 
so did Moses command Joshua, and so did 
Joshua; he left nothing undone of all that the 
Lord commanded Moses." 

Evidently both Moses and Joshua 
were more concerned about obeying God 
exactly than either of them was to be 
his ''own boss and to do as he pleased." 
In this day many a leader will refuse 
to take orders from another leader, feel- 
ing that to do so would be humiliating 
to his own dignity. It was not so with 
Joshua, for when Moses told Joshua 
what the Lord had told him to have 
Joshua do, Joshua left nothing undone, 
but obeyed fully. 

Evidently exact obedience is the 
Christian's stronghold upon God. If 
one dares to obey God, he thereby takes 
a claim upon the Almighty Himself 
for approval. In doing as commanded, 
there is no ground and no room for com- 
plaint of any kind. 

The King Must Obey 

Even kings found this to be true in 
reigning over their people. In 2 Kings 
18 : 6, we have an instance of this sort, 
for of Hezekiah it was said : 

52 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

''For he clave to the Lord, and departed 
not from following* him, but kept his command- 
ments, which the Lord commanded Moses." 

Thus we see that Hezekiah was glad 
to obey the Lord through the commands 
He gave to Moses, although it was about 
seven hundred years after the death of 
Moses when he thus rendered full 
obedience. Notice the emphatic lan- 
guage used of Hezekiah — he clave to the 
Lord, showing the zeal of his heart and 
the intensity of his purpose to be 
obedient, and well he might, for the 
divine approval depended upon his 
prompt obedience. We get another 
illustration of exact obedience in the 
words of Ezra (7 : 23) where it is said : 

"Whatsoever is commanded by the God of 
heaven, let it be diligently done for the house 
of the God of heaven: for why should there 
be wrath against the realm of the king and his 
sons?'' 

In that statement we have several 
emphatic ideas : 

1. That Ezra held that anything 
that God commanded should be done, 
not only as God commanded it, but that 
it should be diligently done, showing 
conclusively that Ezra had a high 

53 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

appreciation of the advantages of exact 
obedience. 

2. We see from the latter part of the 
verse that Ezra understood that dis- 
obedience would bring the wrath of God 
against the kingdom. 

A Mistaken Idea 

Too many of us excuse ourselves from 
exact obedience by thinking that our 
way is as good as any, but the old-time 
servants of God did not so understand 
it. They felt, and rightly so, that God 
had authority to command and there- 
fore it was their business to obey. 

There were some in olden times who 
even dared to disobey God, but they paid 
for it by sacrificing their own lives to 
their disobedience. 

We have a conspicuous example of the 
destruction wrought by disobedience in 
the case of Nadab and Abihu. In 
Leviticus 10 : 1, 2, the case is stated 
thus: 

"And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, 
took either of them his censer, and put fire 
therein, and put incense thereon, and offered 
strange fire before the Lord, which he com- 
manded them not, and there went out fire from 

54 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the Lord, and devoured them, and they died 
before the Lord." 

God's Displeasure 

In this incident we cannot mistake 
the displeasure of God toward disobedi- 
ence. No doubt many of us are tempted 
to think that that w^as done for some 
cause unknown to us in that far distant 
day, — that it cannot apply to the matter 
of obedience on the part of God's chil- 
dren in this day of the twentieth 
century, and yet we know that God is 
the same, that truth is the same, that 
obedience is the same, that punishment 
is the same, and the displeasure of God 
against all those who dishonor Him 
must be the same, and if this be true, 
as doubtless it is, then it becomes the 
ordinary men and women, the church 
members of this day, to be very careful 
in all their services to do things which 
God commands them to do, according to 
His commandments. The examples of 
Nadab and Abihu are by no means the 
only examples of the displeasure of God 
as shown against disobedience. Many 
others in various ages of the world hav^ 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

suffered dreadfully through disobedi- 
ence to the commands of God. 

The Decline of the Church and Its Cause 

We hear much in this day of light of 
a decline of the Church, of the worldly 
church members, of then ignorance of 
the Bible and of the faithlessness of 
men and women who profess to follow 
Jesus. Is it too much to assume that all 
this is but the fruitage of the careless- 
ness and indifference of the people of 
this age in not exactly obeying God? 
Almost every denomination of Chris- 
; ans in the United States, and other 
^.>untries as well, has been on the 
decline for several years, according to 
the statistics which are given as author- 
itative. Will any man dare to say that 
this condition of the people of God, at 
this time, is not due largely to the 
unfaithfulness of the Church and her 
ministers in not obeying exactly the 
commands of the Lord ? 

Take as an illustration the matter of 
the financial support of the Church. 
God has explicitly and emphatically 
given direction by which money shall be 

56 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

contributed for the support of His work. 
It is always to be a free-will offering, 
and yet in the face of this plain com- 
mand, given over and over through the 
Scriptures, we find many church people 
who delight to forsake the Lord's way ; 
and doing so, they invent some way of 
their own to put the Church into the 
money-making business by socials, by 
fairs, by ice cream festivals, by bazaars, 
and a great many other things, wherein 
the Church is made to assume the posi- 
tion of a dependent, begging the world 
to come in and buy at fabulous prices, 
to replenish the treasury of the Church. 
Can there be any wonder that God 
Almighty has seen fit to withhold pros- 
perity from His Church under such 
rank disobedience as this indicates ? 

No Authority for Indirect Methods 

If there is a line, or a word, taken in 
its true sense from Genesis to Revela- 
tion, which authorizes God's people to 
raise money for the support of His 
cause in any of these ways, other than 
by the free-will offering, we have never 
found it — have you ? 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Through the Scriptures God speaks 
expressly, commending to us the giving 
of tithes, of the free-will offering, that 
His house may be supplied with all its 
needs, financially, and yet thousands of 
men and women, whose names are 
enrolled upon the Church book, are 
daring to disobey God's plain command 
and institute these other doubtful and 
untrue methods for supporting the 
cause of Christ. We are told that 
Abraham gave tithes of all he possessed, 
and Solomon, the wise man, said : 

"There is that scattereth and yet increaseth, 
and there is that withholdeth more than is 
meet, but it tendeth to poverty." 

Then, as if emphasizing that thought, 
h(; Jurther said: 

"The liberal soul shall be made fat and he 
that watereth shall be watered also himself." 

Shall We Put God to the Test? 

Malachi brought a great message to 
Israel, bearing on this thought. God 
desired him to say to his people : 

"Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, 
that there may be meat in mine house, and 
prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of 
hosts, if I will not open you the windows of 

58 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there 
shall not be room enough to receive it/' — Mai. 
3: 10. 

Nor is the New Testament lacking in 
instructions upon this very thought. In 
1 Cor. 16 : 2, we read : 

''Upon the first day of the v^eek let every 
one of you lay by him in store, as God hath 
prospered him, that there be no gatherings 
when I come." 

Again Jesus lays special emphasis 
upon this thought, as in Luke 6 : 38, 
when He says : 

"Give, and it shall be given unto you; good 
measure, pressed down, and shaken together, 
and running over, shall men give into your 
bosom. For with the same measure that ye 
mete, withal it shall be measured to you 
again." 

If the Church had the courage and the 
faith to step out upon that promise and 
obey God, not only in giving of their 
money, but in giving of their time, and 
their talents, and their influence, to the 
cause of Christ, the Church would see 
such a day of prosperity as it has never 
known in all its modern history. We 
find it hard to raise sufficient money for 
the support of the cause, and largely 
because we do not obey God. God's bless- 

59 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

ing on what we have will multiply and 
make it ample to meet the needs of our- 
selves and of the cause of Christ as well, 
if we obey Him. 

An Abundance Was Given 

We have a remarkable incident, illus- 
trating this very fact, as given in 
Exodus 36 : 3, 4, 5. You may readily 
recall the circumstance. God had told 
Moses to call upon the people for an 
offering for the building of the taber- 
nacle. The offering was not to be gotten 
from an oyster supper, or a necktie 
party, or a bazaar, or an ice cream 
social, but the money was to be given by 
the people of God, freely given as God 
had commanded. The result was won- 
derful. Gifts came in such abundance 
that it was necessary to send and 
request the people to stop giving, having 
received enough and more. Human 
methods never bring such results, but 
God's way brings these results. Alas, 
for the folly of man's way as against 
God's. What shall be the way of your 
service — God's way, or your own ? 

60 




COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH CO. 



The Test of Abraham's Faith 



Suppose we endeavor to translate 
the Christ of the past into the Christ 
of the present; the Christ of theology 
into the Christ of ethics; the Christ of 
ritual into the Christ of practice; the 
Christ of thfi Church into the Christ of 
the kingdom; the Christ of yesterday 
into the Christ of to-day; the Christ of 
to-day into the Christ of to-morrow. — 
George Dana Boardman. 



HIDING IN A CLEFT OF THE ROCK. 

"In Christ the Eiven Kock I stand; 
All other ground is sinking sand/' 

In all human experience there is noth- 
ing more interesting than a soul bur- 
dened and agonizing in prayer. In the 
Scriptures we have many examples. 
Moses is a type of a praying man. He 
was seeking to prevail with God in be- 
half of his back-slidden people. Judg- 
ing from his language, the word bur- 
dened scarcely indicates the intensity of 
his agony. 

While Moses was in the mount with 
God, Israel had gone into idolatry — 
worshiping a calf of gold. When this 
fact was made known to him, he was 
astounded beyond measure. But he was 
a courageous soul. In the face of such 
terrible spiritual disaster he refused to 
give up his people, and continued to 
plead for their forgiveness. That was 
heroism in prayer. In Exodus 32 : 32, 
Moses rises to the sublime height of 
entire self-effacement, asking God to 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

forgive the sins of his people and de- 
claring that if He would not do that, he 
himself desired to be blotted out of the 
book which God had written. Instead of 
forgiveness, the Lord sent a plague upon 
them, and refused to go with them to 
the land that was flowing with milk and 
honey. Under this refusal to go with 
them Moses was stirred mightily. Then 
he prayed, possibly as never before. He 
sought a closer walk with God and a ful- 
ler and freer communion with Him. He 
did not, as Moses hoped He would, flood 
him with His overwhelming presence in 
a moment. God saw it was better to give 
Moses a smaller view of Himself, and 
therefore the Lord said unto him : 

"Behold, there is a place by me, and thou 
shalt stand upon a rock; and it shall come to 
pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will 
put thee in a clift* of the rock, and will cover 
thee with my hand while I pass by: and I will 
take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my 
back parts: but my face shall not be seen." 
— Exodus 33: 21-23. 

Talking With God 
We know something of this wonder- 
ful conversation between Moses and 



* Clift is the old form of our English word cleft 
-an opening or place of safety. 

64 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

God. The man of weakness pleads with 
the God of strength. Moses said, 

"You say, Bring up this people, that you 
know me by name, that I have found grace 
in Thy sight. Then, if so, show me Thy way 
and remember this nation is Thy people." 

In answer to this earnest plea, God 

said to Moses, 

'*My presence shall go with thee, and I will 
give thee rest." 

Here, again, we see Moses rising to 

his best, as he declares, 

''If Thy presence go not with us, carry us up 
not hence." 

From this it seems that God's pres- 
ence is the infallible evidence of His fav- 
or to them that fear Him. 

It was in answer to this prayer that 
the Lord said: 

"I will do this thing also that thou hast 
spoken, for thou hast found grace in my 
sight." 

Moses was in a great struggle with 
the Almighty. His hunger knew no 
bounds. He was reaching out after 
God, and his cry was — 

"I beseech thee, show me thy glory." 

We are tempted to ask ourselves, Had 
not Moses seen the glory of the Lord 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

over and over? No doubt he had, but 
the greater the burden that rested upon 
him the greater became his desire 
to see the glory of God, which 
would be commensurate with the de- 
sire of his longing heart. Had he not 
seen the Lord's glory when He descend- 
ed upon the mount as in fire (Ex. 19: 
18) ? Had he not also seen His glory 
when He went up into the cloud on the 
mount (Ex. 24:18)? 

Whetting the Appetite 

It is said the increase of appetite doth 
grow by what it feeds upon. That is 
a secret in the Christian life which 
many have not learned. Feeding upon 
God's thoughts whets the spiritual appe- 
tite to an intensity of desire which no 
ordinary force can resist. It was so with 
Moses. He had been feeding upon the 
glories of God, and the more he fed, the 
more he wished to feed. Hence, after 
beholding many of the wonderful dis- 
plays of God's power, we find him again 
crying out, "Show me Thy glory." 

It was in answer to this marvelous 
prayer of Moses that the Lord said, "I 

66 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

will make all my goodness to pass be- 
fore thee/' and then the Lord tells him 
how He will do all this for him. God 
condescends to reason with Moses, say- 
ing: 

"Thou canst not see my face, for there shall 
no man see me and live.'' 

Then the Lord said to him : 

"Behold, there is a place by me and thou 
shalt stand upon a rock, and it shall come to 
pass that while my glory passeth by that I will 
put thee in a cleft of the rock, and will cover 
thee with my hand while I pass by: and I will 
take away my hand, and thou shalt see my 
back parts : but my face shall not be seen." 

What a marvelous favor the urgency 
of Moses' prayer had gained for himself. 

"There is a place by me, and thou shalt 
stand upon a rock!'' 

What safety is implied, what glory is 
promised, standing upon a rock by the 
side of Almighty God! No wonder 
Moses was a great leader — since God not 
only went with him, but stood by him. 

In a Cleft in the Rock 

This leads us to consider the wonder- 
ful promise which God here made to 
Moses, 

67 • 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

I. God's place for His people — by 
Hhn, in a Cleft in a Rock, 

What infinite blessing and honor thus 
given to man — to the soul which, being 
athirst for God, refuses to be satisfied 
without His great fulness. Christ is 
often spoken of as a Rock, and He ever 
lives at the right hand of God, and 
hence, the real meaning is that the place 
of God's people is in Christ Jesus. In 
Christ we see enough of His glory to 
whet the appetite for more and more, 
till the soul aflame with holy love will 
reach up unto Him and be satisfied. 

''Rock of Ages, cleft for me 
Let me hide myself in Thee." 

Thus we are brought to see enough of 
His glory to satisfy the longing heart. 
It is only in this way that the Christian 
enjoys a continual unfolding of the in- 
ner glory which is ever creating a keen- 
er appetite — it can be satisfied only in 
Christ Jesus. 

Sin and Unbdiief Stumbling- Stones 

II. In giving His people a place by 
Himself, God gives a rock-bottom foun- 
dation for their faith. 

68 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Sin and unbelief caused God to refuse 
His presence and rest to Israel. But 
Moses' faith and yearning desire 
brought from God a promise of a yet 
fuller revelation of the glory of heaven, 
but these will never be given to the peo- 
ple of God, except as they stand by Him 
in the Rock, Christ Jesus. 

It is no wonder that many professing 
Christians do not enjoy the Christian 
life. It is no wonder that they fall into 
temptation and make shipwreck of the 
faith — living far off from God, it cannot 
be otherwise. Here Moses teaches us 
a lesson which we cannot neglect, except 
at the peril of our personal peace and 
happiness. 

III. // we would know God and en- 
joy His presence and see His glory, we 
must be hid in the Cleft in the Rock. 

And what is this Rock? It is Christ. 
Then the Cleft in the Rock must be the 
riven side of Jesus. To know this Cleft 
and to make it our refuge is the only 
explanation of the peace and joy of the 
believer in the midst of the disappoint- 
ments and trials of life. To be hid in 

69 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

this Rock is full of meaning: 1. It 
means as our days so shall be our 
strength. 2. It means trials and pov- 
erty are God's method of polishing the 
inner life, bringing it to its best. 3. It 
means pain and disappointment are but 
divine chastenings, preparing the soul 
for a larger life and a better service in 
the kingdom of God. 

The Way to the Larger Glory 
If we may take up the history of the 
eminent saints of God in every age of 
the Church, we shall see that they have 
passed through these trials in coming to 
a revelation of the larger glory of His 
presence. 

IV. In this Cleft the believer is given 
a protecting shield. 

It was given to Moses; it was God's 
own hand placed over his eyes that he 
might not be overwhelmed with the ful- 
ness of God's presence. In other words, 
He was giving Moses all that he was 
able to receive. This protecting shield 
indicates God's purpose to protect us, 
not only from evil, but from the over- 
whelming fulness of Himself, seeing in 

70 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

our weakness we cannot endure the full 
glory of heaven. We cannot bear to 
see the noonday's sun in all its splendor 
with the natural eye, but with a piece 
of smoked glass the natural eye may be- 
hold its beauty and glory. This may be 
the explanation of the fact that real 
Christians can endure so much suffer- 
ing, so much trial, so much disappoint- 
ment, so much humiliation, and yet live. 
This may be the explanation of the fact 
that so many heroes of the faith have 
been able to face death and to go down 
under the executioner's hand and yet 
without fear. This may be the explana- 
tion of the fact that the timid and 
shrinking women of the Christian faith 
have passed over the river, shouting the 
glory of God, fearing nothing. Feast- 
ing upon God, His strength becomes our 
strength. This is the only possible ex- 
planation of the heroism and endurance 
of many of the saints who have passed 
on before, and it will be the hope of as 
many as shall follow. 

71 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Resting in the Cleft of the Rock 

V. Resting in this Cleft of the Rock 
and under the presence of this protect- 
ing hand, Jesus manifests Himself to us 
according to our desire, and our capac- 
ity to receive. 

This glorious life is not for men and 
women who live in a backslidden con- 
dition, who do not pray, who do not 
believe God, and who do not wait upon 
Him. 

The heart with the one burning desire 
to know God shall be given entrance into 
the fuller glory of the divine life. It 
is true, when Moses said, "I beseech 
Thee, show me Thy glory,'' God said, 
*'No man can see me and live/' That 
may mean that no man can see God and 
live the selfish life. It is related of one 
of the old saints, that when hungering 
!*nd thirsting after God, he read this 
^statement which God made to Moses, 
and when he realized its meaning, he 
said, 'Then let me die." That is the 
kind of longing that will win the pres- 
ence of the Lord. The death of the 

72 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

self -life must precede the fullest revela- 
tion of the inner glory. 

Waiting Before the Lord 

This waiting upon God is not child's 
play. It means earnest seeking; it 
means agonizing in prayer; it means 
waiting before God for the enduement 
of the Spirit. He who is so busy with 
this life and its affairs that he can give 
only a few minutes for waiting before 
God, cannot receive this fuller revela- 
tion of the divine presence — cannot 
know of the peace and joy which flood 
the soul of him who is standing in the 
Cleft of the Rock, that he may see God 
by the eye of faith. Spending a mo- 
ment in prayer by the bedside night and 
morning is better than nothing of the 
kind, but that will never bring the vis- 
ions of God to the soul. 

We may learn a lesson of great value 
to the Christian if we will but recall 
the fact that Moses was on the mount 
for six days before the Lord spoke to 
him. Think of it, six days waiting for 
God to speak — six days pleading for the 

73 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

revelation of His presence, for the ful- 
ness of His joy ! Contrast the ordinary 
believer spending two minutes in the 
morning and two minutes in the eve- 
ning by his bedside in prayer, with 
Moses' six days on the mountain top 
waiting for God, and we shall see 
clearly why it is that so few ever pass 
through these larger experiences of the 
divine life. Many of us fail in life as 
Christians, because we wait so little up- 
on God. Well did Isaiah say (40:31) : 

"But they that wait upon the Lord shall re- 
new their strength; they shall mount up with 
wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be 
weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.'* 

Why We Know so Little of God 

We know so little of God, not because 
we have not the opportunity to know 
Him, but because we wait in His pres- 
ence so little. 

In Exodus 24 : 15-18, we read : 

"And Moses went up into the mount, and a 
cloud covered the mount. And the glory of the 
Lord abode upon Mount Sinai, and the cloud 
covered it six days: and the seventh day He 
called unto Moses out of the midst of the 
cloud. And the sight of the glory of the Lord 
was like devouring fire on the top of the mount 
in the eyes of the children of Israel. And 

74 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and 
gat him up into the mount: and Moses was 
in the mount forty days and forty nights." 

From this experience of Moses, we 
may learn that revelations of this kind 
come to only two classes : 

First. To praying people — those who 
wait on the Lord, not for two minutes, 
not for five minutes, not for an hour, not 
for a day, but till He comes — -till the 
answer is given. 

Second. Only to praying people who 
get acquainted with God through a care- 
ful study of His Word. This is the way 
of victory in the Christian life. It is 
not by any power or might of our own, 
but by the power of God manifested in 
us, as before Him we yield ourselves to 
His spirit. 

Not Displeasure But Development 

We must not construe the hardships 
and trials and sorrows and disappoint- 
ments as marks of God's displeasure 
against us, but rather as a method of 
treatment and development for the 
trusting soul. * 



*See Hebrews 12: 6-11. 
75 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

In South America we are told there 
is a flower which can be seen only when 
the wind blows severely. How like true 
piety in the believer ! Some of us never 
show the beauty of the Lord's presence 
until under the tests of the winds of 
temptation and trial and disappoint- 
ment and sorrow — then the beauty of 
the flower of our faith and love and 
hope is seen. Life's burdens often show 
the beauty of human character. It is 
God's way, and that is enough. Under 
God 

"Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up, 
Whose golden rounds are our calamities, 
Whereon our firm feet planting, nearer God 
The spirit climbs, and hath its eyes unsealed." 




COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH CO. 



The Call of Moses 



When taking a journey by train, we 
are not required to understand the work- 
ing of its engine. It suffices that those 
whose business it is to control the 
machinery should be able to manipulate 
it. And so, on the journey of life, it 
is not necessary for us to be able to 
grasp the mysteries of God in order to 
serve Him by loving our neighbors, and 
contributing our small share toward 
making the world what he would have it 
be. — Olive Linnell. 



CROSSING THE BROOK AT 
SUNRISE. 

"Then His truth broke like a flood/' 

Few of nature's scenes are more 
inviting and pleasing than a glorious 
sunrise. Who ever saw a sunrise at sea 
but to remember it as one of the most 
magnificent displays of glory upon 
which his eyes ever looked? Who ever 
ascended to the mountain top of some 
Himalayan range to see the sun rise 
from the very depths of infinite space, 
but that he came down with a concep- 
tion of glory of which he had never 
before dreamed — and ever after his soul 
was ravished with the richness and 
splendor of that glorious morning? But 
there is a sunrise in the heart that sur- 
passes all of nature's glories, and leaves 
an impress upon the man within, never 
to be forgotten. It was this sort of a 
sunrise that Jacob beheld in the morn- 
ing of the greatest crisis of his life. We 
read of it in Gen. 32 : 31 — 

79 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

*'And as he passed over Penuel the sun rose 
upon him." 

A study of this most interesting event 
in the life of one of the most interesting 
men, named in all the annals of history, 
may afford us a season of refreshing as 
we journey along the pilgrim way of 
life. 

Crossing the Jabbok 

There had been an old grudge 
between the two brothers since the day 
when Jacob robbed his brother Esau of 
his birthright. They had been long 
separated ! Alas, what pain wrong-doing 
has brought to human hearts! Now, 
after years of separation, they are about 
to meet again. Jacob seems greatly dis- 
turbed. Sin in a man's life is always 
a disturbing element. Jacob is dis- 
tressed because he fears the anger of 
his brother. Hoping to appease Esau's 
anger, he sends a valuable present on 
ahead. It is the night before, their 
expected meeting was likely to come the 
next morning. That night he was to 
cross over Jabbok. 

80 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 
Alone With God 

He sent his family over the brook in 
advance of his own coming. Jacob 
wished to be alone. Most men do when 
they are earnestly seeking to get right 
with God and their fellows whom they 
have wronged. It was a moment of 
heart-searching. He was feeling his 
way back to God in the darkness. He 
was reaching out, if perchance, he might 
find God and get reconciliation with his 
brother. As he prayed he realized the 
presence of a man as one wrestling with 
him. It was a moment of supreme test- 
ing, although Jacob held his own well 
till toward the breaking of the coming 
day, when the angel saw that he was 
not prevailing against Jacob. Jacob 
was strong and full of resistance. Then 
the angel touched the hollow of his thigh 
and put his limb out of joint, but Jacob 
yet refused to let him go. True, he was 
wounded, but he was full of courage, 
and when the angel pleaded to be 
allowed to go, Jacob declared he would 
not let him go except he should first 
bless him. 

81 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 
A Significant Change 

Then the angel wished to know his 
name. ''Jacob/' was the prompt answer. 
Then the mysterious stranger said : 

"Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, 
but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power 
with God and with men, and hast prevailed." 

Then Jacob wished to know his name, 
but the angel said, 

"Wherefore dost thou ask after my name?" 

At that moment Jacob received the 
blessing for which he was seeking. He 
was in ecstasy! His soul was reveling 
in glory. God had spoken and the light 
had dawned. At once Jacob called the 
name of that place Penuel, for he said, 
''I have seen God face to face and my 
life is preserved." Though he had not 
yet met Esau, he had the answer — the 
assurance that Esau should not destroy 
his life. No wonder Jacob was in 
ecstasy! And just as he was saying the 
words, we are told that he passed over 
Penuel and the rising sun burst upon 
his vision in all of its glory, a beautiful 

82 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

symbol of the rising of the light divine 
in his own heart. 

A Marvel of Glory — Face to Face With God! 

What marvels of glory burst upon 
his vision as he moved on to 
meet and reconcile his offended brother ! 
Many another man might have the sun 
rise in his soul, if like Jacob, he would 
earnestly and truly seek reconciliation 
with the persons he has wronged. God 
help us all to do this good work, if 
indeed it to-day remains undone. It is 
the price of peace — the peace which 
passeth understanding. 

In the ^'ourney of Jacob from the 
home of Laban to meet his brother Esau 
he passed through mental cyclones, not 
one, but many. That journey in some 
striking way illustrates the journey of 
all men who from the scenes of wrong- 
doing go out to seek after God, and as 
such it may become an instructive lesson 
for us all. 

Pausing Along the Way 
In the journey Jacob had four noted 
stopping-places. We might call them 
stations along the way. If we mistake 

83 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

not, each station has its lessons for all 
who inquire after God. 

Bethel was the first station. 
It was the place of awakening. 
Jacob had dealt severely with Esau. 
The act had involved himself in sin. 
From this he must be delivered, and to 
this end God met him at Bethel in a 
dream, and in that dream there were 
such manifestations of the divine pres- 
ence as to awaken the transgressor — 
he began to see himself as guilty of the 
sin of supplanting his brother. God 
was dealing with him, and so positively 
that Jacob knew it. When he awoke the 
impressions of the dream were so deep 
and positive that he found himself 
saying — 

*^ Surely the Lord was in this place and I 
knew it not." 

After a moment's reflection, he said 

to himself — 

"How dreadful is this place! This is none 
other but the house of God, and this is the 
gate of heaven," 

and he called the place Bethel, for there 

he had been awakened to a sense of his 

sins. 

84 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Mahanaim ivas the second station. 
It was the place where he met the 
angels, or the messengers. Here they 
both camped. Hence it was the place of 
the two camps. In this incident is 
embodied a very beautiful thought. 
Jacob having started on a journey in 
the right direction, God sent the angels 
to him, indicating the divine support in 
his effort now to make the wrongs of 
the past right. This thought is con- 
firmed from another standpoint in the 
instance of the temptation of Jesus. 
After Jesus had withstood the tempter 
under the test of great hunger, the devil 
left him, and then the angels came and 
ministered unto him. So it seems in 
every noble effort to withstand wrong, 
we have the support of God. What an 
inspiration to the weary and burdened 
ones in their search for God! Every 
soul sincerely returning to God by for- 
saking the sins of the past comes to 
Mahanaim in his journey — the place 
where divine support is given, enabling 
the penitent one to continue the upward 
and onward journey toward God. 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Jabbok was the third station. 

Jabbok means the flowing brook, a 
beautiful symbol of the work of regen- 
eration in which the sins of the penitent 
are washed away. He is cleansed and 
so comes nearer to God, even the near- 
ness of partaking of the divine nature 
(See 1 Peter 1:4). It was here at the 
flowing brook of Jabbok that the great 
struggle took place between Jacob and 
the angel. It was here that Jacob 
prevailed and got for himself a new life 
and a new name. From this place of 
a struggle Jacob arose in the early 
morning and bravely continued his jour- 
ney, seeking to meet his brother Esau, 
and as he journeyed he came to^ — 

Penuel, the fourth station in this 
journey. 

Here he saw God face to face, and as 
he passed over Penuel the sun rose upon 
him, flooding his way with the glory of 
its light. How beautifully like the 
coming of the light to the soul which 
has left all to follow Jesus. It is the 
rising of the Sun of Righteousness, 
coming in all of His glory to give a glad 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

welcome to the wanderer as he comes 
back to the Father. 

This fourth station in the journey of 
Jacob is as far ahead of Jabbok as was 
that place ahead of Mahanaim, or as 
Mahanaim was ahead of Bethel. It is 
the outline of a progressive experience 
in which the seeking soul is led nearer 
and yet nearer to God, till at the last 
station he is flooded with the light of 
God — it is 

Sunrise in the Heart 

Many have deceived themselves by 
supposing that they could make this 
journey without stopping at each 
station — that they could go on to Penuel, 
to the sunrise in the heart as the first 
and only station, but not so. God has 
lessons for the penitent to learn at 
Bethel, and till these are learned he is 
not prepared for the teaching which 
awaits him at Mahanaim. He must 
take his lessons only where they are 
given and where he is best qualified to 
receive them. It was so with Jacob. 
At Bethel he was awakened to see 
his true situation before God. At 

87 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Mahanaim he was shown the power of 
God to give him support as he pressed 
on to the light. At Jabbok he was 
taught the mystery of the new life. Till 
this moment he had not been prepared 
to know the meaning of Jabbok. The 
lessons at Bethel and at Mahanaim were 
necessary to the understanding of the 
truth given him at Jabbok, just as the 
lesson at Jabbok prepared him to 
receive the instruction God had for him 
at Penuel. Having received the light in 
each progressive step, he was now ready 
for the rising of the sun, for the flooding 
of his soul with the light of God in 
which he might go on and on, doing the 
will of God, to the end of his life. If 
Jacob had never made an effort to 
be at peace with his brother, this fulness 
of light he would never have received, 
and Jacob at best would have remained 
Jacob, the supplanter, ever contending 
for place and power among men. 

Onward and Upward 

Having yielded to the call of God, he 
was led onward and upward from glory 
to glory, till standing in the full blaze 

88 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

of victory he was ''face to face with 
God," the highest achievement known to 
man in the earthly life. 

**Lord, lead me on to higher ground, 
Oh, lift me up, and let me stand, 
By faith, on Heaven's table-land; 
A higher plane than I have found; 
Lord, plant my feet on higher ground/' 

Are you seeking to have the sun rise 
in your heart? Then follow God's 
leading through Bethel (awakening) ; 
through Mahanaim (meeting the mes- 
sengers of truth) ; and over Jabbok 
(flowing, cleansing), where the most 
momentous event in your life will come 
(the fight of faith), where, prevailing 
with God as Jacob did, you may pass 
over the spiritual Jabbok and at Penuel 
greet the rising of your spiritual sun, 
and in the light thus given, see God face 
to face — it will be the coming of the 
fulness of the new life in Christ. If the 
believer is to come into possession of 
this exalted life, then he must have the 
praying spirit as did Jacob, when he 
resolutely said to the angel, with whom 
he wrestled : 

**I will not let thee go, except thou bless me." 

89 



/ have thought, I am a creature of a 
day, "passing through life as an arrow 
through the air, I am a spirit come 
from Gody just hovering over the great 
gulf, till a few moments hence I am no 
more seen, I drop into an unchange- 
able eternity, I want to know one 
thing — the way to heaven, how to land 
on that happy shore, God Himself has 
condescended to teach the way; for this 
very end He came from heaven. He 
hath ivritten it down in a Book! O give 
me that Book! At any price, give me 
that Book of God! I have it: here is 
knowledge enough for me. Let me he a 
man of one hook. — John Wesley, 




COPYRIGHT, 1901. BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH CO. 



Jacob at Bethel 



The ''common things'' of life are all so 

dear — 
A half-blown rose may brighten a day. 
Much more the word of cheer you 

remembered to say, 
One look, with all one look may mean 
Of love and hope, deep-felt and not 

unseen — 
It fills with wine the cup of the soul, 
In its struggle to live — and live to 

life's goal. 
To be, means most to trust, not fear. 
For recompense in life's ''little things" 

so dear, 

— Mary Ettah Calhoun, 



NO CRADLE ROCKING IN THE 
PULPIT. 

"An Ehud inspires a Shamgar." 

The Prophet Ezekiel speaks of men 
who daub a wall with untempered mor- 
tar. The reference is undoubtedly to 
men who are unfaithful as teachers of 
truth and righteousness. Untempered 
mortar! That will not hold when the 
storm tests it. It was a criticism of 
the preachers of his day. The question 
now is, not what the prophets of old 
did, but what are we doing to-day to 
merit such criticism? Do we not bring 
this criticism upon ourselves by the 
preaching we give to the people? Do 
our sermons lack in virility of gospel 
truth? Are we afraid to declare the 
whole counsel of God? Afraid, lest we 
offend some leading member of the 
church we are serving? Did you ever 
think of it as a fact in your ministry, 
if we avoid offending a man, who is liv- 
ing in sin, that we shall thereby offend 
God and so imperil our own salvation, 

93 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

as well as that of the men and women to 
whom we preach ? This tendency is not 
only human, it is awfully human, and 
a shame to the ministry. If we have 
not backbone enough to declare to the 
people their sins, let us quit the minis- 
try and go to plowing corn. Of all men 
among men,- the minister needs to be 
the gentlest, the truest, the most 
humble, the most faithful, and at the 
same time, the most courageous. He 
needs to realize that his message is not 
a lullaby, that it is not designed to rock 
people to sleep, but rather to arouse 
them and to bring them out of the 
sleep of sin to real life in Christ. If the 
minister understands his business, he 
knows that he has a message from God 
to sinful men — men who stand in 
danger of the judgment. So instead of 
seeking to let men down in an easy way, 
he needs to face them with their sins, 
as did Nathan, the prophet, when he 
faced David with the great sin of his 
life. That is the way to bring men to 
repentance and to life in Christ. We 
can never do it by whitewashing a 
man's conscience — never! 

94 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 
No Weakling Can Serve 

In no age of the world has God sent 
His message to men through one who 
was possessed of a man-fearing spirit. 
He cannot use a coward to fight sin! 
God wants a man who is daring enough 
to obey — to do w^hat He tells him to do, 
one who will dare to make His ''message 
clear and plain to sinful men/' 

One of the bravest of God's messen- 
gers of the long ago may serve as a 
good example for us of to-day. In the 
days of Israel, God's people went into 
sin, and as a rebuke to them, He per- 
mitted Eglon, a king of a neighboring 
nation, to place them in bondage. After 
eighteen long years of subjugation, they 
repented of their sins and cried to God 
for deliverance. To deliver them. He 
must remove Eglon, their oppressor, 
but to do this He must have a man 
who was not afraid to do His bidding. 
For this purpose He raised up Ehud, 
a left-handed man, to be His special 
messenger to Eglon. He gave him a 
message to this king, and so impressed 
Ehud with the responsibility of that 

95 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

message that he felt he must deliver it, 
though he well knew to do so might 
mean the loss of his own life. Under 
this impulse he went to Eglon, king of 
Moab, but his first visit did not seem 
to accomplish its purpose, but nothing 
daunted, he returned, and going alone, 
except he had the presence of God with 
him, he went directly into the presence 
of the king, and said to him : 

"I have a message from God unto thee." 
At once the king commanded his 
attendants to retire, and when the two 
were alone, face to face, Ehud drew 
from under his raiment over his right 
thigh, a dagger and stabbed to death 
the king who for eighteen long years 
had kept the people of God in bondage. 
Then he retired, locking the door behind 
him, and escaped. The Word tells us 
that Ehud was raised up for this very 
purpose. It seems that the average 
man is not equal to the great tasks of 
God, and so He raises up special men 
for deeds of daring. 

96 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 
The Called Man Is Equipped 

A marx thus called to do the Lord's 
work is equipped from on high, and 
will dare to do whatever God may com- 
mand. Herein we get a great lesson 
for the ministry of the twentieth 
century. God cannot, and will not, use 
a man in the ministry who is afraid to 
tell the truth as God may direct him to 
do. God cannot and will not use a man 
who seeks to rock the people to sleep 
with a soothing message, when the call 
is to do great things for God in awaken- 
ing the people to a sense of their sins. 
Then a man who has a message from 
God cannot afford to rock the cradle. 
He needs rather, like Ehud, to declare 
that he has a message from God for the 
people, and then deliver it, leaving the 
matter of what is to follow in the hands 
of God — knowing that He will take care 
of His own. 

In studying Ehud's message and act, 
let us bring it to bear upon our own life- 
work as ministers. 

Observe the nature of the message 
Ehud gave, 

97 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

It was a message of life and death — 
to the king it was a message of death, 
because he had grievously sinned 
against the people of God. From a 
spiritual point of view, that is the 
nature of the message God sends 
through us to-day. It is a matter of life 
and death. Its rejection, is followed by 
death. No greater responsibility was 
ever laid upon the heart of man than 
such a message to a disobedient and 
gainsaying people. 

Observe the preparation of the mes- 
senger sent of God, 

There was no man qualified to fill the 
place. Because of this God raised up 
Ehud. The first thing Ehud did was to 
prepare himself for his work. 

God had made him left-handed, con- 
trary to what most men would have sup- 
posed a necessity. Then Ehud made a 
dagger, and concealing it under his gar- 
ment on his right side, he went to the 
king. 

No Rocking of the Cradle in the Pulpit 

Ehud studied the situation, after 
which he sent his men away ; and, alone. 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

he went into the presence of the king. 
Being left-handed, he had buckled the 
dagger on his right thigh. Ehud did 
not go to King Eglon with the thought 
of rocking him to sleep as a babe in his 
cradle. He had no lullaby for that king. 
He appeared in his presence, and said : 

*'I have a message from God unto thee." 

And at once Eglon, King of Moab, 
was slain and Israel was delivered from 
the power of her enemies. No weakling 
could have been used to do such work. 
It took a man who had been called and 
qualified, a man who was brave, even 
daring, a man who preferred to be 
faithful to every other privilege — he 
went into the presence of the king and 
delivered his message. 

Observe the character of the message. 

It was 'the most terrible of all 
messages, that of death. A great 
sin had been committed. Israel had 
been in bondage for eighteen years. 
Eglon would not let up in his persecu- 
tion of the people of God. In this 
moment of desperation, Israel cried 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

unto God for deliverance, and God was 
ready, for He had prepared Ehud, and 
as God's messenger, Ehud strikes 
Israel's oppressor down. 

A Message of Holy Daring 

The minister's should always be a 
message of holy daring, and it should 
be faithfully delivered. Let not the 
minister fear the face of man. Not 
only his own welfare, but the welfare 
of the people is wrapped up in his faith- 
fulness to his trust. Under these cir- 
cumstances the man who seeks to ''rock 
the cradle" in the pulpit is a traitor to 
Gid. 

The fate of Eglon is tvarning to 
wrong-doers, 

God's care over Israel is but His 
promise to His people for all lands and 
for all ages. To the people who cry to 
God in deepest sincerity there shall 
come deliverance. He will not suffer 
His enemies to destroy them. If need 
be, the message shall be a message of 
death, rather than leave His dependent 
ones in the hands of their persecutors. 
The wicked man is as truly in the hands 

100 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

of God and at His mercy as any other. 
Let the minister learn from Ehud's suc- 
cess that God is with him whom He has 
sent. Never mind as to the difficulty in 
the way; never mind as to the danger 
by which he is surrounded, only let him 
be sure that he has a message from God, 
and then be faithful in delivering it, 
for God will not let a message He sends 
return unto Him void. It must accom- 
plish that for which He has sent it. 

Observe the boldness of Ehud. 

He went in open day into the king's 
home, where he was surrounded by his 
attendants. With such a terrible mis- 
sion he stood in the king's presence with 
none to support him except the God who 
sent him. He knew if he failed, death 
would be his only portion, and, 
hampered, as he was, he moved forward 
with the courage of a Spartan, delivered 
his message, and did his work. That 
was no ''rocking the cradle," it was no 
''lullaby song," it was not the perform- 
ance of a weakling. It was the work 
of one commissioned from heaven. 

101 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Was It Murder or More? 

But did not Ehud murder Eglon? 
Some so regard it, but it was more than 
murder — it was the vengeance of God 
against a man who had dared to oppress 
His people. It was more — it was the 
answer of God to an oppressed people 
who had cried mightily unto Him for 
deliverance. It was simply the execu- 
tion of an old and hardened criminal, 
one who, though often reproved, had 
stiffened his neck and hardened his 
heart, refusing to obey God — he was 
suddenly destroyed. Eglon had been 
found guilty, and Ehud was God's mes- 
senger to execute the penalty. Even so 
in the work of the Christian ministry! 
Sometimes ministers are judged to 
be harsh messengers, are denounced 
because of their message, are refused 
T 'cognition because of their faithful- 
iiess! But the man who stands true to 
God, and the highest and best interest 
of His people, must deliver the message 
God has given him, no matter what the 
consequences may be. This principle 
has been often illustrated. We find its 

102 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

execution upon Cain, upon the people 
in the time of Noah, upon Pharaoh, 
upon Ahab, upon Solomon, upon Bel- 
shazzar, upon Herod ; everywhere, when 
men refuse to yield to God, death is the 
penalty. Though the message be one of 
terror, the minister dare not fail, for 
when the minister fails to do God's bid- 
ding, then he involves himself in the 
same penalty and loses all. To-day 
there is a message from God for the 
people. 

It Is a Question of Faithfulness 

The ministry is charged with the 
solemn duty of faithfully delivering 
that message. The question for every 
individual who thus bears the message 
of God is one of faithfulness. He must 
deliver the message and leave the result 
with God. The minister stands with 
Ehud and declares to the people : 

"I have a message from God unto thee." 

Do you ask what is the message of 
the minister to the people in this the 
twentieth century? 

I answer — 

103 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

A Message of Repentance and Recon- 
ciliation. 

It seems almost as if repentance has 
gone out of fashion in human society, 
even largely so in the Church, but it is 
ever the warning message from heaven. 
The message of Jesus Christ Himself 
comes thundering down through the 
ages to men and women everywhere : 

"Repent ye, for the kingdom or heaven is 
at hand." 

He emphasizes the importance of this 
message, when He says : 

"Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise 
perish." 

The importance of this message of 
repentance cannot be overestimated, for 
if there be no repentance, there will be 
no forgiveness, and if there be no for- 
giveness, there can be no salvation. 
How terrible is the responsibility of 
being such a messenger! How fearful 
will be the punishment meted out to the 
man who accepts the place of God's 
messenger and then proves untrue to it ! 

"We pray you in Christ's stead, be ye recon- 
ciled to God." 

104 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

That was the plea of Paul. It is the 
plea of the minister, as he gives this 
message to the lost in every age. Paul 
assured the people in his day that God 
is in Christ reconciling the world unto 
Himself. If the ministry shall be 
unfaithful to this message, then recon- 
ciliation cannot be effected, and both 
minister and people will come under 
the judgment of God. It is not a lullaby 
message. The minister has not time to 
''rock the cradle," that he may put 
people to sleep in their sins. His is a 
different work. The people must be 
awakened. They must be made to 
realize the enormity of sin and the 
coming of a fearful judgment to them 
who believe not the gospel. 

The Urgency of the Minister's Plea 
Let the minister cry : 

"This is the message that I bring, 
A message angels fain would sing: 
'Oh, be ye reconciled to God!'" 

A Message of Faith, 

It is seemingly coming to pass in this 
day of ''intellectualism" that men 
assume to depend upon what they 

105 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

knoiVy rather than upon what they 
believe — rather than upon their faith 
in God. We are more ready in many 
instances to believe man than to believe 
God. Forget not this is the Word of 
God, 

"Believe on Him that sent me." 

Christian faith is the father of more 
victories than all human learning has 
yet produced, apart from divine power. 
It has reached down to the depths of 
human society, and it has lifted the 
lowest heavenward, under the trans- 
forming grace of God. 

"He that believeth on me shall Tiave ever- 
lasting life.'' 

Salvation itself is dependent on our 
faith. By faith the walls of Jericho 
fell, and by faith the powers of sin are 
broken and the victory of grace is given. 

A Message of Appeal Unto God. 

We do not hear much of this crying 
unto God for deliverance from sin. In 
olden time men cried: 

"What must I do to be saved?" 

106 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

It was the power of the preached 
Word that made sinners quake and 
tremble. That power fully manifested 
among men will bring crime to an end. 
When men feel the power of God upon 
them, when they are made to see them- 
selves as lost sinners, there is no trouble 
about getting them to cry unto God for 
deliverance. When Israel had been 
eighteen years in bondage to Eglon, 
their cry was mighty before God, Ehud 
was sent, and Israel was speedily deliv- 
ered from her enemies. 

A Message of Service and Love. 

The minister's message in this twen- 
tieth century to men and women who 
have been brought into the light of God, 
is a message of service and of love, as 
well as warning. Jesus said : 

"If any man will serve me, him will my 
Father honor." 

That is a great promise and a great 
reward offered. These are the facts of 
the minister's message to men to-day. 
Some men like to be ''rocked to sleep'' 
in their sins by a ''milk-and-water" 
message, which means nothing, but the 

107 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

man who truly realizes what his situa- 
tion is, as he stands in the depths of sin, 
will not wish any such gush of mean- 
ingless words — he wants the plain 
message of God that he may believe and 
live forever. 

The True Minister a Man of Courage 

Of all men the minister must be a 
man of courage, or his will become the 
message of a weakling, and under 
such preaching the people will perish, 
and the minister will be responsible. 

Oh, brother minister, dare you take 
a stand — dare you say, and mean it, by 
God's grace, — 

"I will dare to be a Daniel, 
I will dare to stand alone! 
I will dare to have a message — 
I will dare to make it known!" 



108 




No Uncertain Sound 



Wouldst thou have thy life the brighter? 
Make another's burden lighter, 
Wouldst thou know the joy of living? 
Find it by the grace of giving. 
Wouldst thou precious seeds be sowing? 
Blossoms bloom, thou still unknowing. 
Wouldst thou golden grain be reaping? 
Trust the harvest to God's keeping. 
Wouldst thou lose all fear of dying? 
Each day live — on Him relying. 

— Helen Elizabeth Coolidge. 



A REVOLUTION EXTRAORDINARY. 

''Thou shalt be turned into another man." 

It is a great day in Israel — a crisis is 
upon their government. They have been 
ruled by the judges — judges given of 
God. But the day has come when 
human nature clamors to be heard — 
asserts itself above the command of 
God. Israel is calling for a king to rule 
over them. God has forewarned them 
of what their demand would mean to 
them. He has told them of the evils of 
monarchy, but they said, ''We want a 
king; we want to be like other people.'' 
At last He yielded to the extent of per- 
mitting them to have a king, and Saul 
was chosen. The hour for his anointing 
as king has come. Samuel is making 
ready for the imposing ceremony. 
Turning to Saul, he said : 

"And the Spirit of the Lord will come upon 
thee. . . .and thou shalt be turned into another 
man.'' 

So much for the beginning of the 

kingdom of Israel. Its history is 

111 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

familiar to Bible readers — ^there is no 
need to follow the details. 

Two things are emphatic in the nar- 
rative : 

First, SauFs preparation for his 
service as king could never have been 
complete till the Spirit of the Lord came 
upon him. 

Second, When the Spirit of the Lord 
came upon him, Samuel said Saul 
should be turned into another man — he 
would no more be the Saul of the past, 
but a new Saul, qualified of God and 
sent to do a specific work. 

The Spirit Changes the Man 
Let us notice upon what the prepara- 
tion of Saul depended — the coming of 
the Spirit of God upon him. Let us also 
notice the effect — Saul became another 
man. Is there not a hint here of the 
coming of men and women to the day of 
their anointing, when they shall receive 
power from God and be changed from 
the carnal to the spiritual man? 

Saul was coming to a new kingdom. 
He was to be king. He was to rule for 
the good of the people and for the glory 

112 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

of Jehovah. The parallel appears when 
we think of men and women coming to 
God as His servants to receive the 
divine anointing in the kingdom of the 
spiritual life. Here a true servant finds 
the realm of his largest usefulness and 
of his highest joys. 

The changing of a life into another 
life is of the highest importance to 
every individual. Saul must have this 
change wrought of the Spirit of God, 
before he could become the Lord's 
servant in this new sphere. It is just 
as true of men and women to-day that 
before they can enter upon the largest 
sphere of God's service, they must be 
endued with power from on high, the 
Spirit of the Lord must come upon 
them, changing them from a cold- 
hearted life to a life warm and glowing 
with the life of Christ. 

A Radical Difference 

Let us observe that when a man is 
changed, spiritually, he becomes a new 
man. Character in the new man is 
radically different from character in the 
old man. This wonderful work is 

113 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

wrought of God that men may come 
into possession of the larger gifts of the 
Spirit. It is nothing less than a change 
to what we know as the higher life. 
This is what was meant when it is said 
that Saul should be changed into 
another man, for we read in verse nine 
that God gave him another heart. After 
all, the heart-life is the main issue in 
this probationary state. If the heart is 
changed, the life is changed. If the 
heart be not changed, no matter how 
much profession of change there may 
be, there will be no change of life. 
Sometimes men are led to profess a 
change of heart when nothing has been 
done for them. That is always disas- 
trous. A false profession can never lay 
a sure foundation. An impure heart 
offers inducements for the indwelling 
presence of the wicked one, just as a 
pure heart becomes the abiding-place of 
the Spirit. There is all the difference 
possible between the heart that is filled 
with the Spirit and the heart that is 
either empty, or in possession of the 
wicked one. 

114 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

May Not Cast Out Evil Return? 

Some man asked Mr. Moody once if 
when the house was cleansed — Matt. 
12 : 43-50 — there was not a chance for 
the wicked one to return and again 
occupy it. Mr. Moody said, *'It is pos- 
sible, for if you send the devil out by a 
mere pledge, or by a resolution in your 
own strength, he will come back. He 
will come to the front door and say, 'Is 
there anybody inside T If no answer is 
given him, he will then go around to 
the back door and cry, 'Is there anybody 
inside?' If silence is still the answer, 
he knows that Christ is not there. Then 
he will smash the door open and walk 
in through all your resolutions, bring- 
ing seven devils with him, and each 
worse than himself, and he will fill your 
heart with the riot of sin. On the other 
hand, if the heart has been truly 
cleansed by the power of God, and 
Christ has come in to live there, then 
when the devil asks, 'Is anybody inside?' 
Christ will say, 'I AM HERE/ and the 
power of His presence will drive the 
wicked one away, and the pursued soul 
will have victory over the tempter." 

115 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

Deliverance and Dedication 
But some men will say, "How can this 
all be done?" To the blind this seems 
impossible, but to one whose eyes have 
been opened to see the truth in its 
beauty, it is plain enough that this won- 
derful change of the heart is wrought 
by the Spirit of God, and the new man 
thus formed is mighty, not in himself, 
but through God, to the pulling down 
of the stronghold of sin. The incoming 
of the new life means specially two 
things to every believer — deliverance 
from the self -life and the dedication of 
the new life to God. Some people shrink 
from this abandonment of the self-life, 
and some people fear to dedicate them- 
selves wholly to the service of God, but 
these things only indicate the continued 
presence of the evil one, rather than the 
fulness of the divine life. Deliverance 
from the power of sin and dedication of 
the whole life to God — ^these are the 
urgent needs of the life of the believer. 
This thought rested heavily upon the 
mind of Paul when he said : 

"I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the 
mercies of God that ye present your bodies 

116 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable to God, 
which is your reasonable service." 

The fruit of such deliverance from 
selfishness and such dedication to God 
is non-conformity to the world. Rather 
it means a transforming and a renew- 
ing of the man for the largest service, 
according to the perfect will of God. 

The Gain of the New Life 

But some men will say, What is the 
gain from passing from the old life to 
the new? There is much every way. 

The new man gains a new life. 
The new life gains a new capacity. The 
new capacity is endowed with new 
power. The new power works in a new 
sphere and does a new service, which 
brings forth a greatly enlarged f ruitf ul- 
ness in the kingdom of God. 

It may be said that while this is pos- 
sibly true of Saul and other great men, 
it cannot be true of the ordinary men 
and women of our day. That is wrong. 
God's gifts are for the common people, 
just in proportion as they will qualify 
themselves to receive them. True, in 
the text it was for a king, but remember 

117 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

that when the old man is made new in 
Christ he comes to possess a kingly 
character and therefore is entitled to 
the very best gifts of our heavenly 
Father. 

Certainly Peter understood it in this 
way, for in his First Epistle (2: 9) he 
says: 

^^'But we are a chosen generation, a royal 
priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; 
that ye should show forth the praises of him 
who hath called you out of darkness into his 
marvellous light: which in time past were not 
a people, but are now the people of God : which 
had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained 
mercy." 

A Kingly Character 

What a change the grace of God thus 
works! Every man who is truly 
changed by the Spirit becomes not only 
kingly in character, but he enters into 
a royal priesthood for the service of 
God. This but brings out the idea, 
already suggested, that when men are 
changed by the power of God, they 
cease to be of the old nature and become 
kings and priests unto God. Surely a 
royal priesthood must have some refer- 
ence to a kingly life. The true Christian 

118 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

has a kingly life, because it is made 
after the pattern of the King of kings 
and Lord of Lords. Nor is Peter alone 
in this estimate of the kingly qualities 
of the Christian life: John also takes 
a similar view, as we find by reference 
to Revelation 5 : 9, 10, where, in speak- 
ing of the work of the redeemed, he 
says: 

"And they sung a new song, saying, Thou 
art worthy to take the book, and to open the 
seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast 
redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every 
kindred, and ^ongue, and people, and nation; 
and hast made us unto our God kings and 
priests: and we shall reign on the earth." 

Reigning With Christ 

What does he mean by reigning on 
the earth with Him ? We are to inherit 
kingdoms. What would a kingdom be 
without a king? Blessed thought, we 
are to reign with Christ! 

The anointing of Saul was but the 
preparation for the larger service to 
which God had called him. In this is 
indicated to us the thought that we, too, 
are called to a new kingdom, to a new 
spiritual life, in which great service is 

119 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

demanded, and for which we must be 
anointed of God. 

The liberty of the spirit-endowed man 
is the most priceless inheritance of the 
sons of light. It sets us free from the 
bondage of the law, and the ways of 
sinful man, setting us at liberty to do 
the will of God. George MacDonald 
said: 

"So long as God's will is our law, we are 
slaves, but when God's will becomes our will, 
duty becomes pleasure, and service a delight." 

Surely this is a glorious liberty of the 
sons of God. 

One Thing Is Settled 

One thing is settled, we must be born 
"gain, we must become new men under 
'ne Spirit. Then we must be endued 
with the spirit of service. So Jesus 
Himself taught. See John 7 : 38, 39. 
There are many good things in the lives 
of men. A creed, morality, culture, 
good works, even worship and good feel- 
ing, but none of these can make us 
Christians. They are, in so far as 
genuine, the outgrowth of the Christ 
within. They speak of a work that 

120 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Jesus has done within. Christianity is 
the process of a new birth. We are 
born out of the world of flesh into the 
kingdom of the Spirit. With the new 
birth all these things contribute to the 
development of this life, but without the 
new birth all these are failures, for we 
cannot pass into the spiritual life, 
except as God changes the natural man 
into the spiritual. 

"A dear one in heaven thy heart yearns to see, 
At the beautiful gate may be watching for 

thee ; 
Then list to the note of this solemn refrain, 
*Ye must be born again.' '' 



121 



Each day a clean white page, and we 
are artists whose duty it is to put some- 
thing beautiful on the pages one by one; 
or we are historians, and must give to 
the page some record of work or duties 
or victory to enshrine and carry away. 
— Phillips Brooks. 




Imploring 



GOD'S FINGERS 

''During a revival service a man 
prayed for the conversion of a neighbor 
and said: '0 Lord, touch my neighbor 
with Thy finger, with Thy finger, O 
Lord/ Just then an inner voice said: 
'You are God's finger. Did you ever 
speak to your neighbor concerning his 
souVs salvation? You go and touch the 
man and your prayer shall be heard!' 
The man arose. His conscience was 
awakened and accused him. Almost a 
lifetime had he lived near his neighbor, 
and not once had he spoken to him about 
the need of regeneration. Hundreds of 
opportunities came and went, but the 
conversation at such times was not 
about the one thing needful, but about 
the weather, politics, crops, business, 
etc. The first duty of a Christian, to 
witness for Christ, was left unfulfilled. 
How is it with youV^ 



A MIRACULOUS MODE OF 
COMMUNICATION. 

'The Lord made him understand." 

Marvelous phenomena abound every- 
where. Every age thinks the inventive 
genius of man has reached its limit. 
Almost a hundred years ago a Patent 
Department official, thinking nothing 
more would likely be invented, and 
rather than have the department die on 
his hands, resigned. If he could rise 
from the grave and behold the wonders 
of inventive genius since that day, he 
would laugh at the fears which drove 
him from office. Alas! How liable to 
err is human judgment! 

We have few greater wonders than 
modern methods of communication. 
Even in these there is rapid develop- 
ment and large gains. Our postal 
service was once a wonder, as a means 
of communication between men. This 
was eclipsed by the Morse telegraph, 
and later by the telephone, through 

125 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

which persons could converse for hun- 
dreds of miles. Then came Fessenden 
and Marconi with their wireless tele- 
graphy, astounding the world by sending 
messages great distances through the 
air. Now even the wireless must take 
a back seat, since the wireless telephone 
has given man power to hear the human 
voice at a distance of practically five 
thousand miles. 

It Surpasses All Others 

Truly the age rolls on, but wonders 
do not cease, especially in the matter of 
wonderful and rapid systems of com- 
munication among men. But in the 
face of the wonders of modern com- 
munication there is an ancient method 
which surpasses them all. It is given 
to us in Chron. 28 : 19, which reads : 

"All this, said David, the Lord made me 
to understand in writing by His hand upon 
me, even all the works of this pattern." 

David was referring to the pattern 
and specifications which God had given 
him for building the temple. As a 
method of communication it far sur- 
passes all human inventions. Indeed, 

126 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

that text is one of the most remarkable 
passages in the Bible — it is an enigma 
to all human comprehension. 

Strange as it may seem, though God 
gave David the pattern for building a 
house of rest for the ark, yet because 
he had been a man of war and blood- 
shed, he was not allowed to build — he 
must needs turn the pattern and specifi- 
cations over to his son, Solomon, to do 
the work. The text is David's explana- 
tion to Solomon, as to how he got these 
— the Lord gave it to him by writing 
with His hand upon David's body. 

A Marvel of Marvels 

We can believe in the sign alphabet, 
as a means of communication between 
the dumb ; we can believe in the raised 
letter for the blind; we can believe m 
the call of signals, as between ships at 
sea; we can believe in the practical 
workings of the telegraph and of the 
wireless, and in the wireless telephone, 
but it staggers the faith of the average 
man to be told that God gave David the 
plans for that great building by writing 
with His hand upon his mind and heart. 

127 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

How easy it is to believe in the ingenu- 
ity of man, and yet how hard, how diffi- 
cult, to grasp the thought of God and 
accept it as truth ! The thought of that 
text is worth careful study: 

I. The Fact of God's Writing Upon the 

Human Heart. 
That God has a method of communi- 
cation with the believer. Christians 
must admit. The thought may be a 
mystery, but mysteries are facts, not- 
withstanding. God has a way of writ- 
ing upon the human mind which cannot 
be questioned. Man is very dependent 
on God for his understanding of all 
moral and spiritual ideas. That God 
can adapt His thought to our under- 
standing, either by the illumination of 
the Word for us, or by the impressions 
made upon us by His Spirit, may be 
marvelous, but Christians cannot doubt 
the fact. 

II. How Is This Writing of God 
Wrought Upon the Mind and Heart 
of Man? 

David said God did it by His hand 
upon him. This is adapting the thought 

128 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

of the invisible to the language of every- 
day usage, that we may the more readily 
grasp the divine idea. Thus God 
enriches the mind and heart. To be 
assured of God's presence, giving to us 
His message, is the highest privilege of 
the believer in the earthly life. It was 
after this manner that He gave to David 
the pattern of the temple — gave it in 
writing upon his person by the divine 
hand. Marvelous, but true ! 

Written With the Hand of God 

As David understood this mystery, 
the hand of God traced the very letters 
upon David's consciousness, spelling out 
word by word God's specifications for 
building the temple. 

The very thought amazes us, but is 
anything too hard for God? Did not 
God write a message of warning upon 
the walls of Belshazzar's palace? And 
may He not just as easily and readily 
write a message upon a human heart 
which has been fully yielded to Him? 
Do you ask why God did not write upon 
Belshazzar's heart, instead of the walls 
of the palace? Most likely because Bel- 

129 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

shazzar's heart was not only blind, but 
hardened. A stone wall is as suscep- 
tible to an impression from God as is the 
heart of a hardened and resisting 
sinner. 

III. The Purpose of This Writing on 
DavicVs Person. 

It was God's way of giving to him 
plans and specifications for the temple, 
making all so plain to him that he was 
able, not only to carry the thought in 
his own mind, but to give the pattern 
God had given him, to his son, Solomon, 
who should build the house instead of 
David, his father. God not only spoke 
to David, but to Solomon through his 
father. 

IV. God's Design in Having His People 
Understand Him. 

An understanding of truth is the 
foundation of all progress. If God 
could not make man understand His 
purpose, then all Christian progress 
would cease. We know for every life 
God has a work, and He is amply able 
to qualify us to do it, if "we are teach- 
able. Men question a fact so startling, 

130 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

and yet they are believing things day 
by day which are more strange than 
God's marvelous method of communica- 
tion with man. Man has shown ability 
to instruct the lower order of animals. 
The hog has been educated and so has 
the horse ; even birds of the air can be 
taught by the skill and ability of man, 
and yet man stumbles over the fact of 
God's ability to impress the human 
mind with His own thought. 

Can Man Do More Than God? 

Do you think a man can do more 
in teaching and training a hog, 
a dog, a bird, or even a horse, 
than God can do in teaching a man 
and making known to him His 
plan for the salvation of the human 
family? We are told that Luther Bur- 
bank, the great California scientist, can 
take a tree that has been going to the 
bad for years, so that it has become 
altogether ugly and noxious and worth- 
less, that he can take that tree and by 
giving it the shock of a new force, 
can break up its decline and its old 
habits and turn its energies into new 

131 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

channels and bring it to new life and 
make it a live and fruit-bearing tree. 
Listen! If a man can do that, why 
should it be thought a thing incredible 
that God, the Creator of all things, can 
break up the old sinful life of a man and 
by imparting to him new and divine life 
recreate in him the Christ life of right- 
eousness and holiness, and teach him 
how to do the will of God among men? 
Oh, Unbelief, in shame hide thy face 
forever and let us be assured that noth- 
ing is too hard for the almighty hand of 
God to do. 

The Believer's Teacher 
Let us study this thought in its bear- 
ing upon the Christian's life and 
service. What God did for David in 
building the temple. He can do for us 
in building the spiritual life. God told 
David how to build the temple. He can 
just as easily tell the believer how to 
shape his life and make it a place for 
the indwelling of the Spirit. Paul 
teaches us that the believer is the temple 
of the Holy Spirit. Is not this, then, 
a sufficient guarantee that God gives us 

132 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the pattern of the Christian life with 
specific instruction as to how to build 
it and maintain it? Does He not by the 
impressions He makes upon us by His 
Spirit really write upon our thought, 
His wishes and purposes, as on a sheet 
of paper? Of course, this work must 
be done under specific conditions. The 
paper on which the writing is made 
must be of a quality well suited to 
receive the impressions of the pen. You 
cannot write on rough, spongy paper — 
it will not receive the work of the pen. 
Even so a heart rough in sin and hard- 
ened against God, cannot receive the 
impressions the Spirit would write 
thereon. Is this idea Scriptural? Does 
the New Testament anywhere hold up 
such an idea ? Let us read 1 Corinthians 
2:9, 10: 

"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither 
have entered into the heart of man, the things 
which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him. But God hath revealed them unto us 
by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all 
things, yea, the deep things of God." 

Do You See the Difference? 

Thus the prepared heart may easily 
receive a God-given message, while the 

133 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

unprepared heart cannot grasp it at all. 
Man in sin is blind and deaf and unfeel- 
ing, not physically, but morally and 
spiritually. He lives in a dungeon of 
spiritual darkness. Without help there 
is no chance to reach the light. 

As illustrating in a somewhat remote 
way God's dealings with His blinded 
children, we may use Helen Kellar, who 
was blind and deaf and dumb. She lived 
in a dungeon of darkness, not of stone, 
but of flesh. It did seem impossible to 
help that helpless child, and yet God 
planned the way to light for her, till 
to-day Helen Kellar is a very bright 
woman. Her early days were spent in 
darkness because she could not com- 
municate with her fellows. She had 
ability to think, but no way to give 
expression to her thoughts. She tried 
to make signals to those about her, but 
she could get no response. Thus she 
groped her way in her helplessness. In 
her body was a beautiful life, but it was 
shut up in darkness and silence, the 
results of blindness, deafness, and 
speechlessness. In the course of time 

134 



THE OLD TEST A^I EXT 

God sent to Helen Kellar a teacher of 
rare ability, skill, and patience. That 
teacher discerned evidence of a beauti- 
ful life shut up in her afflicted body. He 
used his best ability to reach her 
imprisoned inner life. He made many 
experiments by way of seeking to open 
the doors of her life to outside thought. 
In feeding her, he attempted to tell her 
what it was she was eating. As she ate 
an orange, he placed his fingers upon 
her throat and her fingers upon his 
throat, and by means of the finger 
alphabet he spelled the word o-r-a-n-g-e. 
When he gave her water to drink, he 
did the same. One day he found her 
suffering pain, and he wrote upon her 
throat by his hand, 'T love you." After 
a while she made the same effort, and 
said to him by her fingers on his hand, 
'T love you.'' It was the dawning of 
the light. The teacher saw victory 
ahead and persevered, and Helen, 
though blind, began to pick up new 
rays of light, she began to see, if not 
through the eye, yet through the mind. 
Later, Helen passed into the care and 

135 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

under the instruction of a lady to whose 
wisdom the world is a debtor. By the 
means of her fingers on Helen's body 
the new teacher told her of the beauti- 
ful worlds of sight and sound. She told 
her that, notwithstanding to her it 
seemed as if the world were darkness 
and silence, yet it was full of beauty and 
music. 

Helen was amazed and almost unbe- 
lieving, but the teacher said to her: 

"Because you cannot see and hear, 
you must not say there are no beautiful 
sights and no enchanting music." 

Meantime Helen was making great 
progress in grasping the true situation 
about her. One day Bishop Brooks 
came to visit Helen. He said to her : 

''God loves you.'' 

By signal she replied : 

"I know He does, I have felt Him 
nigh, but didn't know who He was." 

That day she gained her highest idea 
of the God who made her. Though 
blind and deaf and dumb, she went 
speedily from one realm of knowledge 
to another, and from one kingdom to 
another, till through the writing of the 

136 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

finger upon her person by her teacher, 
great windows of light were opened to 
her darkened life. In this light she was 
able to answer many questions. So she 
went on from one subject to another 
till her visit to the St. Louis Exposition, 
when, by the marvelous gains she had 
made, she was able to write a glowing 
account of her visit and what she saw ! 
Few women were able to write so 
clearly and definitely of the Exposition 
as did Helen Kellar — it was the outcome 
of the writing of a finger upon her body. 
Now Miss Kellar understands much of 
the beauty of the stars, the mountains, 
the landscape, the rivers, of music, of 
art, of life, of time, and the coming 
glory of eternity. Now she goes on catch- 
ing flashes of light and drinking of the 
fountains of love — all made possible by 
the writing with her teacher's finger 
upon her body. Suppose she should now 
tell of the joy that dwells in her being in 
this glad 'moment of triumph, in this 
victory of life and light, could she not 
readily and gladly say with Paul — 

''Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither 
have entered into the heart of man the things 

137 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him, but God hath revealed them unto us (who 
love Him) by His Spirit." 

Light Dispels Darkness 

That was a marvelous revelation 
which is given to all believers who yield 
themselves body, soul, and spirit to God. 

If these glad floods of light were 
given to Helen Kellar as she lived in 
darkness by the writing of a man's hand 
upon her body, why may not God in 
His great power, goodness, and infinite 
mercy, deal even more lavishly in giving 
light to His benighted ones who seek 
His face and live for Him? Why not? 
Is anything too hard for the Lord? 
Surely not. Till God speaks, till He 
writes with His finger upon the heart, 
we are all as — 

"An infant crying in the night — 
An infant crying for the light — 
And with no language but a cry!" 



138 




An Oriental Court Scene 



The ever-varying beauty and loveli- 
ness of the landscape, the magnificence 
of the sun, moon, and stars, and the 
sky, in which they move, the grandeur 
of the mountains and the majesty and 
atve of the sea are all but evidences of 
'the Spirit's artistic hand in giving 
shape and beauty to the creative work 
of God. It is not too much fo say that 
every object in nature, animate and 
inanimate, which has been preserved in 
form and color, as it came forth in the 
beginning, is but an expression of the 
Spirit's thought of the beauty of 
the divine life. If we stand in a great art 
gallery, we are bewildered with the evi- 
dences of artistic taste, but standing in 
nature's hall of art, we are overwhelmed 
with the glory of the Spirit's finished 
work. All this is but the mirror of 
God, reflecting His matchless work in 
the redemption and salvation of man. 
The glory of the spiritual is reflected 
in the natural — and it is all a prophecy, 
a veritable foretaste of the life which ^> 
hid vjith Christ in God. — Kipyar. 



THE BELIEVER'S UNSEEN BODY- 
GUARD. 

"Flitting, flitting", ever near thee, 
Sitting, sitting by thy side." 

Have we not distorted ideas of the 
angels ? Who are they and what is their 
mission? They are God's messengers 
among men, ministering to the heirs of 
salvation. Angels are interesting char- 
acters, not so much because of them- 
selves as because of the mission on 
which they are sent and the work they 
do — protecting God's people. In Ps. 
34 : 7 we read : 

"The angel of the Lord encampeth round 
about them that fear Him, and delivereth 
them.'' 

David was evidently face to face with 
some great danger when he gave expres- 
sion to his confidence in the protection 
of the hovering angel of the Lord. It 
may have been when he was exposed to 
the wrath of Saul in the cave of 
AduUam. At any rate, he had been 
graciously spared when in grave danger. 

141 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

With the wisdom of a sage he attributed 
his safety to the presence and power of 
the angel of the Lord. That belief had 
long been common to the people of God. 

Ruling Out the Angels 

In these modern days the materialist 
rules out the idea of protecting angels. 
They no longer expect to see the 
evidence of their presence, nor to hear 
the rustle of their wings. Men and 
women in their mad rush for modern 
thought regard the talk of protecting 
angels as superstition. They accept the 
Sadducean teaching that there is no 
spirit, nor angel, never mind what the 
Bible may say. Paul was not a Sadducee. 
Referring to the angels in Heb. 1 : 14, he 
asks : 

"Are they not all ministering spirits sent 
forth to minister for them who shall be heirs 
of salvation?" 

A Strange- Scene 

Nor was this doctrine common only in 
Bible times. In every age of the world, 
which has been noted for its depth of 
spiritual insight, God's people have been 
believers in the protecting presence of 

142 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the angels. The sainted Doddridge tells 
of a remarkable dream he once had. He 
seemed to be in the vestibule of heaven, 
and while waiting for admittance, he 
was in an ante-room. Certain pictures 
on the walls seemed strangely familiar, 
and so drew his close attention. He 
found the pictures were representing 
familiar incidents in his own life. One 
showed him falling from a horse, and 
just above him, as he went to the ground, 
\yas an angel following him, and so on 
through his life he saw picture after 
picture, the angel being a close attend- 
ant, protecting and keeping him from 
danger. 

"A guardian angel o'er his life presiding, 
Doubling his pleasure and his cares dividing." 

Jesus believed and taught the pres- 
ence of the guardian angels in life. They 
ministered to Him in the temptation. 
(Matt. 4: 11) Besides, in referring 'to 
children. He said : 

*^In heaven their angels do always behold the 
face of my Father."— Matt. 18 : 10. 

Watching and Protecting 

Both the Bible and human experience 

confirm the thought of the angels of God 

143 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

watching over and protecting the people 
of God in any time of peril. Some one 
has said : 

"If you woo the company of the angels in 
your waking hours, they will be sure to come to 
you in your sleep." 

Merely camping about the believer 
would not necessarily signify protection, 
but when it is added, ''and delivereth 
them,'' then we get the definite idea of 
their blessed ministry among men. 

"How sweetly did they float upon the wings of 
silence through the empty-vaulted night, 

At every fall smoothing the raven down of 
darkness till it smiled." 

We therefore conclude that the work 
of ministering angels is — 

I. To Minister to the Needy. 

Jesus knew of their ministry : 

"And He was there in the wilderness forty 
days tempted of Satan, and was with the wild 
beasts, and the angels ministered unto Him." 
—Mark 1 : 13. 

Who shall say that in the moment of 
need or of peril, that the angel of the 
Lord does not encamp about them that 
fear Him ? We may not always be con- 
scious of His presence, but He attends 
us. 

144 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

"Sweet souls around us watch us still, 
Press nearer to our side: 
Into our thoughts, into our prayers. 
With gentle helpings glide.'* 

The mission of the angels is not to 
all peoples, regardless of their relation- 
ship to God — they minister to them that 
fear the Lord and strive to do His will — 
heirs of salvation. 

11. To Strengthen the Weak, 
After long continued strain, Elijah 
was about to give up. Just then the old 
prophet heard a whisper — an angel 
touched him and said : ''Arise and eat.'' 
—1 Kings 19 : 5. 

Making Our Enemies Weak 

It was perhaps the weakest moment 
in Elijah's ministry, but in that moment 
an angel was at his side to strengthen 
and help him. How wonderful is the 
presence of the angels of God in the 
moment of peril ! 

ni. To Make Weak Our Enemies. 

That angels should be sent to minis- 
ter to the servants of God when they 
need to be protected and kept from dan- 
ger, seems a marvelous thing, but even 
that seems not comparable to the more 

145 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

startling fact that the ministry of angels 

includes the making of our enemies 

weak and helpless, as has often been 

demonstrated in the history of the 

people of God. It was true with Daniel 

in the lions' den when he declared: 

"My God hath sent his angel and hath shut 
the lions^ mouths, that they have not hurt me." 

IV. To Deliver His People From the 
Power of Their Enemies. 

Even Lot, though he kept his eye very 

largely upon business, yet when in peril, 

angels came to his assistance. 

"And when the morning arose, then the 
angels hastened Lot, saying, Arise, take thy 
wife and two daughters which are here, lest 
thou be consumed in the iniquity of this city." 
—Gen. 19 : 15. 

Pulled Out of the Fire 

Lot was reluctant to give up his home 

and his possessions. He hesitated, he 

lingered, but in the midst of his halting, 

the angels laid hold upon his hand, and 

of the hand of his wife and his two 

daughters, the Lord being merciful unto 

him, and they brought him forth, and 

set him without the city. 

"But all God's angels come to us disguised; 
Sorrow and sickness, poverty and death, 

146 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

One after other lift their frowning masks, 
And we behold the Seraph's face beneath, 
All radiant with the glory and the calm 
Of having looked upon the front of God." 

Did not the angels of God deliver Lot 
almost under his protest? This 
emphasizes in a marked way the 
determined purpose of God to protect 
the heirs of salvation. (Heb. 1 : 14) 

Moses recounted the perils to which 
Israel had been exposed, and made his 
plea before God for help. At once 
(Numbers 21:16), the answer was 
given : 

"And when we cried unto the Lord, he heard 
our voice, and sent an angel, and has brought 
us forth out of Egypt; and behold, we are at 
Kadesh, a city in the uttermost of thy border." 

Life in the Border of the City 

How beautiful the thought — life in 

the very border of the city of God. By 

and by we shall go into that city and 

occupy the place prepared for us by the 

Lord Jesus Himself. 

Not only was this teaching as to the 

ministry of the angels believed by the 

people of God, but some of the ancient 

kings who knew but little of God came 

to understand the truth. 

147 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

^'Then Nebuchadnezzar spake and said, 
Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach and 
Abednego, who hath sent his angel and deliv- 
ered his servants that trusted in Him." — Dan. 

3: 28. 

If the truth of the ministry of angels 
needs to be established, it would seem 
that Nebuchadnezzar's testimony added 
to that of the Bible and the people of 
God ought to be amply sufficient. 
Although not an adherent of the teach- 
ings of God, Nebuchadnezzar was com- 
pelled to admit the truth of the ministry 
of angels. If anything were lacking to 
affirm the purpose of God to protect and 
save His people from danger, we still 
have Isaiah 63 : 9 : 

"In all their afflictions, he was afflicted, and 
the angel of his presence saved them; in his 
love and in his pity he redeemed them; and he 
bare them and carried them all the days of 
old." 

A Blessed Relationship 

This is one of the most remarkable 
passages in the Old Testament. It rep- 
resents God in a relationship to His 
people which mortals can hardly grasp. 

God's marvelous way of linking Him- 
self to us in our troubles but intensifies 

148 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the thought of the certainty of His help 
in time of need. 

The thought of being afflicted with 
them seems quite beyond human com- 
prehension. This conception of God's 
relation to His people is sustained in 
the New Testament. In Acts 12 : 11, we 
read : 

''And when Peter was come to himself, he 
said, Now I know of a surety that the Lord 
hath sent his angel, and hath delivered me out 
of the hand of Herod and from all the expecta- 
tion of the people of the Jews." 

Peter understood his deliverance from 
prison as the work of the angel of the 
Lord. He had no doubt about it — *'Now 
I know of a surety that the Lord hath 
sent his angel and hath delivered me." 

The idea of personal protection is com- 
mon in human governments. Our Pres- 
ident rarely appears in public except 
that he is watched and protected by the 
Secret Service men. Even our Secretary 
of State, on his pleasant visit to Panama, 
was surrounded by these watchmen, 
whose business was to protect him from 
harm. When the Emperor of Germany 
goes out, he is accompanied by a 
mounted guard to protect him from his 

149 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

enemies. The Czar of Russia is also 
protected in like manner, showing con- 
clusively that lives which are highly- 
prized by the people are also protected 
by the people. The value of the life of 
a king is the excuse for such protection 
by the governments of earth. Then 
what is the basis of the value which 
heaven places upon the life of the chil- 
dren of God that He should send angels 
to guard and protect them when in dan- 
ger? John tells us in Rev. 1 : 6, we are 
both kings and priests unto God. No 
wonder the secret service angels of 
heaven attend us and protect us ! 

Why Angels Minister 

This may throw light upon God's 
reason for sending angels to minister to 
them who shall be heirs of salvation. 
If so, it brings into the light the great 
value God puts upon men and women 
for whom His Son gave His life. He 
would save from sin, from ruin, so He, 
too, sends the angels from heaven, to 
encamp round about His people and to 
deliver them in any moment of peril. 
Oh, let us sing : 

"Praise God from whom all blessings flow, 
Praise Him all creatures here below; 
Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts, 
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." 

150 




COPYRIGHT. 1901, EV PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAP 

Comforting the Believer 



''Church of the living God, 

Born of the Spirit's power, 
This is the day of might, 

This is the very hour; 
Rise in the strength of Him, 

Master of life and love; 
Open the heart to take 

Virtues that rise above 
Common and earth-horn things; 

Virtues that have the breath 
Of God and Heaven in them. 

And fear not sin or death; 
Spirit of power, we pray. 

Breathe on our souls and give 
Peace that Thy men may love; 

Love that Thy world may live.'' 



GOD BIDS HEZEKIAH GOOD-BYE. 

''So he returned with shame of face to his 
own land." 

Strange things occur everywhere, 
whether in science, philosophy, or relig- 
ion. Behind these strange things, how- 
ever, especially as they are related to 
God in His government of men, we shall 
always find a reason, at least when we 
go far enough to sound these depths of 
mystery. Human history marks God's 
pathway through the ages. Each world 
event indicates a stopping-place in the 
work of His kingdom. Among the 
strange things in the doings of God is 
His dealing with His children. We have 
a number of instances, illustrating this 
fact, as in the case of His leading 
Abraham out into a country of which 
he knew nothing ; in permitting Isaac to 
bless Jacob instead of Esau ; in having 
Moses reared and trained in Pharaoh's 
court; withholding for a time an 
answer to David's prayer (See Psa. 
51) ; in Peter's fall as the highway to 

153 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

his establishment in the Christian 
faith; in sending John to the Isle of 
Patmos, as a prisoner, that he might be 
honored with a vision from Heaven, the 
like of which no other human eye had 
seen ; in allowing Jacob to see so many 
things as against him ; in allowing Jere- 
miah to go to prison; John the Baptist 
to be beheaded; or John Bunyan to 
spend twelve years in Bedford jail; or 
John Huss to go to the stake, and the 
thousands of other instances, in which 
God's children have been led in a way 
they knew not, but always for good in 
the end. It is from this standpoint that 
we invite you to join us in the study of 
the most critical moment and event in 
the life of Hezekiah, one of God's fav- 
ored sons, as when God bade him ''good- 
by'' and left him to fight his own battles. 
You may read of the incident in 2 
Chron. 32:31: 

"God left him, to try him, that he (Heze- 
kiah) might know all that was in his heart." 

A Good King, But — 

Hezekiah had the reputation of being 
a good king, and of course, a good man. 

154 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

His history is interesting and highly 
instructive, especially as it leads up to 
the moment when God left him. 

Hezekiah had become very rich — a 
dangerous moment in any man's life. 
He had great treasures of silver 
and gold, precious stones, spices, and 
jewels; a great abundance of corn and 
wine and oil; great storehouses, stalls 
for beasts, cotes for flocks, and we are 
told that God gave him this great 
wealth, but what did the king do with 
his great wealth? 

Hezekiah seemed to believe in doing 
great things. We are told, in the chap- 
ter from which the text is taken, that 
he stopped the upper watercourse of the 
Gihon and, turning its flow, he brought 
it straight down to the west side of the 
city of David. In all of this great 
undertaking his prosperity hardly had 
bounds to it. With all this favor before 
him, how could Hezekiah forget God ? 

A Great Shadow 

But it happened with Hezekiah, as 
with many others. In the day of his 
greatest prosperity a great shadow 

155 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

came over his pathway. He was taken 

very ill in the midst of all of his wealth 

and greatness. Isaiah came to him with 

a message from the Lord, saying : 

"Set thine house in order: for thou shalt 
die, and not live." 

The thought was crushing to the rich 

king. He turned his face to the wall 

and began to pray, weeping profusely. 

At this juncture the Lord sent Isaiah to 

Hezekiah with another message. It was 

this: 

"I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy 
tears: behold, I will add unto thy days fifteen 
years." 

Then, as if to remove any possible 
doubt that He would keep His promise. 
He said : 

"I will bring the shadows of the degrees on 
the sun dial of Ahaz ten degrees backward," 

and Hezekiah was restored to health. 
If ever there was a time for humility, 
gratitude, and praise to God in the life 
of Hezekiah, it must have been at this 
moment. As he thought over the hours 
of his extreme illness, he had a vivid 
recollection of the fear which then 
oppressed him. He describes it, saying : 

156 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

"Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter : 
I did mourn as a dove/' 

A Great Deliverance 

And then, realizing his wonderful 

deliverance, he cried out : 

''What shall I say? He hath both spoken 
unto me and himself hath done it." 

The healing of Hezekiah had doubt- 
less attracted great attention far and 
near. Among others who heard of the 
great event was the king of Babylon. 
His son, Merodach-baladan, sent Heze- 
kiah a letter, congratulating him on his 
restoration to health, and at the same 
time and by the same hand, he sent a 
present to Hezekiah, who admitted that 
he was glad of it. Being proud of his 
wealth and fame, he opened all he had 
to the messengers who brought the let- 
ter and the present from Babylon, 
showing them all he had. Soon after 
the messengers were gone, Isaiah came 
to see Hezekiah. He asked him what 
these men had said to him and from 
whence they came. Hezekiah told him 
without reservation that they came 
from Babylon, but he did not tell him 
what they said to him. 

157 



GARDEN SPOTS ^N 
A Startling Question 

Isaiah had a mission to Hezekiah, and 

his first question was, 

"What have they seen in thy house?*' 

Hezekiah answered : 

"All that is in my house have they seen: 
there is nothing among my treasures that I 
have not showed them." 

The truth is, Hezekiah, in his great 
desire to glorify himself in the sight of 
the great men of Babylon, and to gain 
their favor, had failed to glorify God 
in the matter of his serious sickness 
and his wonderful recovery. He had 
shown the princes of Babylon every- 
thing he had, all of his treasures, all of 
his greatness, and all of his glory, as a 
king, and though the letter from Baby- 
lon had spoken of his illness, yet Heze- 
kiah, so carried away with his own 
greatness and with the honor paid to 
him by the Babylonish government, for- 
got to say a word of God's great good- 
ness to him in sparing his life and 
restoring him to health. In other words, 
selfishness had gotten the mastery of 
the good king. It seems quite clear that 
he had an overmastering desire to make 

158 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

a great impression upon the princes 

from Babylon, with the probable 

thought that he might make an alliance 

with that government, which in case of 

trouble with Assyria, or with some 

other nation, would make him strong 

unto victory. God had been his strength 

in other days and his deliverer in the 

time of need, but a little attention from 

Babylon had seemed to induce him to 

forget God. It was just here that came 

in the incident of the text : 

^'God left him, to try him, that he (Heze- 
kiah) might know aU that was in his heart." 

The Purpose of God's Withdrawal 

Most surely God left Hezekiah in the 

hands of the wicked one that he might 

be brought to see himself in the light 

of Heaven — turned over to Satan that 

he might be awakened and saved. Even 

in turning the backslider over to Satan 

God shows His mercy. Not only is such 

a course necessary for the salvation of 

the backslidden, but quite as much so 

to preserve them that are whole. The 

poet had this in mind when he said, 

"One sickly sheep infects the flock, 
And poisons all the rest." 

159 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

No wonder Burns said : 

*^0 wad some power the giftie gie u& 
To see oursels as ithers see us!" 

Beyond all question the most danger- 
ous thing in a man's life is heart-blind- 
ness — when he does not know himself, 
does not know what is in his heart. 
This was Hezekiah's condition, and it 
seemed as if the only thing the Lord 
could do to open his eyes was to leave 
him for a time, that he might come to 
know his real condition — to recognize 
that he was indeed backslidden. 

An Awful Moment 

It is an awful moment when the Lord 
must needs leave a man, leave him to 
his choice and under the powers of 
darkness, that he may be brought to 
know what is in his own heart. This is 
a vital matter. Heaven depends on it. 
If a backslider is not brought to realize 
his lost estate, that he has fallen from 
grace, that he has turned against God, 
he will be lost. It is with the thought 
of awakening the man that God does 
with many of us as He did with Heze- 
kiah — He leaves us, to try us, that we 

160 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

may come in the moment of trial to 
know that we are lost and undone 
through our own sin. Hezekiah must 
be awakened, he must come to see him- 
self as he is, he must know what sin is 
in his heart. Thus God's love for His 
own is so great as to lead him even to 
turn away from a straying one that He 
may bring him back through repentance 
and faith to the ways of truth and 
righteousness. Indeed, Paul tells us in 
1 Cor. 5 : 5, that it sometimes becomes 
necessary to deliver a straying child 
over to the devil for the destruction of 
the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in 
the day of the Lord Jesus. David was 
once in such a condition. God, whom he 
had offended, refused to answer his 
prayer till he had been rescued from the 
power of the wicked one — ^till he had 
been brought to repentance. See Psa. 
51. Men and women, dead in sin, must 
be awakened, or they will never come to 
life in righteousness, and with life they 
are undone forever. No doubt, there 
are thousands of church members 
to-day who have fallen into sin, as had 
David and Hezekiah. If the Lord 

161 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

should leave them as they are, they are 
undone by sin. In many cases the Lord 
awakens them to the awful reality of sin 
by leaving the straying one to himself 
for a time, that such an one may see 
the awful truth that in the heart he is 
backslidden. 

A Strange Word-Picture 

In The Ancient Mariner there is one 
of the strangest pictures, jax first one 
is tempted to feel that there is nothing 
like it in all the world, but there is. Its 
counterpart is often found in a church. 
Coleridge, in one part of that wonderful 
story, represents a ship at sea with the 
seamen all dead, and yet rising up to 
man the ship — there were dead men 
lulling the ropes, dead men steering the 
snip, dead men spreading the sails, 
^ou may declare that was but-a poetic 
fancy, but I declare I have seen 
churches that remind me of this strange 
dream of the imagination. I have seen 
men who seemed to be spiritually dead 
in the pulpit, in the choir, among the 
church officers, in the membership, the 
deacons seemed dead, and often dead 

162 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

men and women seemed to be sitting in 
the pews. Now what is the difference 
between those two scenes? Only this, 
one was a poet's picture, while the other 
is so frequently a reality in many of our 
churches. Do you ask. Why does 
God leave us under such trying circum- 
stances ? It looks as if he sees it as His 
only chance to reach us and bring us 
back to our spiritual senses and to Him- 
self. He is not confined to any one way 
of truly reaching us, but it seems to be 
more often than otherwise by the way 
of suffering that He brings us back. 
Men and women are most commonly 
reached by refining and purifying. 
Hence we read in Mai. 3 : 3 — 

"And He shall sit as a refiner and purifier 
of silver: and He shall purify the sons of 
Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that 
they may offer unto the Lord an offering in 
righteousness." 

Through the Purifying Fires 

That reveals God's purpose in leaving 
us to go through the purifying fires 
alone. He seeks to bring us back to the 
making of an offering unto the Lord of 
the life in righteousness. Plenty of men 

163 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

and women make an offering unto the 
Lord in sin, but such an offering cannot 
be accepted. Hence the Lord leads us 
through these fires of testing that we 
may be led to forsake sin and come back 
to a life of righteousness, where we may 
make an acceptable offering of the life 
we live unto the Lord. Even when He 
delivers one over to Satan for the 
destruction of the flesh (evil impulses) 
He does it in love and for our highest 
and best interests. Zechariah (13:9) 
so presents the thought : 

"And I will bring the third part through 
the fire, and will refine them as silver is 
refined, and will try them as gold is tried: 
they shall call on my name, and I will hear 
them; I will say. It is my people; and they 
shall say. The Lord is my God." 

In that passage is revealed to us just 
what is accomplished by the refining 
process. It brings us back into close 
relationship with God. He declares 
that when we have been tried, as gold is 
tried, that then we may call upon Him 
and He will hear. Then He will say: 
*lt is my people,'' and they shall say, 
'The Lord is my God." Surely, the 
refining process has worked our return 

164 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

unto the Lord in the little season when 
He has withdrawn His face from us. 

All this refining and testing process 
is God's way to bring us back to the 
truth and to the life which is in Christ. 
God tried it on David, and it was a great 
success. How do we know it was a 
great success? Listen to David's own 
testimony after he had passed through 
it all, as brought out in Psa. 17 : 3 — 

*'Thou hast proved mine heart; thou hast 
visited me in the night; thou hast tried me, 
and shalt find nothing; I am purposed that 
my mouth shall not transgress. '* 

"Thou Art the Man" 

Oh, what a change since the day of 
David's great sin! Then he shut his 
eyes, went headlong to the murder of 
Uriah.. Then came Nathan and said to 
him: 'Thou art the man!'' He was 
condemned and miserable, and the Lord 
let him alone for a time, till he had been 
led through the fiery crucible in which 
he was purified, till coming back to God 
as in the fifty-first Psalm, he made 
peace with God, and now that he is once 
more God's servant, profiting by past 
experiences, he determines by the grace 

165 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

of God that he will no more depart from 
the way of righteousness, and now he 
seems to rejoice in the fact that God has 
tried him, has visited him in the night 
and has tried him thoroughly. Or, as 
the Hebrew has it, thou hast smelted 
me, meaning as gold ore is smelted to 
separate the pure gold from the dross, 
giving the pure gold its right value and 
sending the dross to its place. So David 
felt, and now he seems to triumph in 
the thought that he is ready for God's 
testing at any time and under any cir- 
cumstances. How wonderful are God's 
ways of saving us from sin and from 
ourselves!* How beautifully the poet 
has seen it all ! 

"What! take it at adventure, and not try 

What metal it is made of? No, not I. 

Should I now lightly let it pass, 

Take sullen lead for silver, sounding brass, 

Instead of solid gold, alas! 

What would become of it in the great day 

Of making jewels — 'twould be cast away!" 



* These are not two separate and distinct ways of 
saving men — they are parts of one complete plan. Jesus 
saves the unregenerate but penitent and believing soul 
from the curse and guilt of sin by the shedding of His 
own blood, making an atonement for sin. On the other 
hand He uses the smelting process of human suffering to 
bring back to Himself His straying and backslidden chil- 
dren, lest they should be overcome and swallowed up in 
sin and death. He afflicts, not willingly, but rather than 
have us lost forever, "For whom the Lord loveth He 
chasteneth and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth." 
— Heh. 12: 6. This treatment yields the peaceable fruits 
of righteousness in the life of the afflicted and straying 
child of God. 

166 




Was Elijah Forsaken of God ■ 



THE WRONG LEARNING 

/'A man may know all about the rocks, 
and his heart remain as hard as they; 
he may know all about the winds, and 
be the sport of passions as fierce as 
they; he may know all about the starSr 
and be as a meteor, whose end, after' a 
brief and brilliant career, is to bt 
quenched in eternal night; he may know 
all about the sea and his soid resemble 
its troubled waters, which cannot rest, 

'^A man may knoiv how to rule the 
elements, yet not know how to rule his 
own spirit; he may know how to turn 
aside the flashing thunderbolt, but not 
the wrath of God from his oivn guilty 
head. He may have all the knovjledge 
of a Newton, a Laplace, a Watt; he may 
knoiv many mysteries and understand 
many hidden things, but if he has no 
personal knowledge of the love of God, 
brought near to sinful men in Christ, 
what shall it avail ?'' 

''For what shad it profit a man, if he 
shdll gain the whole world, and lose his 
own soul? or what shall a man give in 
exchange for his soul?'' 

—Mark 8:36,37. 



COVERED WITH SILVER AND 
GOLD. 

"A silver light illumes, 
And gleams of verdant gold.'' 

Contrasts are more or less striking 
and interesting. We get a vision of the 
ends of things. God is continually con- 
trasting the ends of human character; 
the one is set over against the other, 
that we may the more fully grasp the 
meaning. One of these contrasts we 
find in Psalm 68 : 13. It is full of 
meaning. It reads : 

"Though ye have lien among the pots, yet 
shall ye be as the wings of the dove, covered 
with silver and her feathers as yellow gold." 

In this contrast we get a view of the 
ends of human life — its beginning and 
its finishing. It holds up to our view 
a life in sin and a life in Christ; or, 
rather, a life begun in sin and finished 
in sin, and a life begun in sin and fin- 
ished in Christ. The central thought of 
the text is the great transformation of 
human character as wrought by the 

169 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

blood of Christ, under the power of the 
Holy Spirit. 

Transformation of Character 

We do not need the proof from the 
Scriptures as to the truthfulness of this 
thought, for we have seen over and over 
a person living in the blackness of sin, 
transformed into the whiteness of the 
righteousness of Christ — -a literal trans- 
formation from the smut of sin to the 
gold of a Christlike character. The text 
itself is full of lights and shadows, 
showing a life despoiled by sin, but 
saved by grace. Such a study of the 
divine life is well worthy of our most 
prayerful thought. 

I. Unregenerate Man Is Like a Dove 
Among the Pots. 

It is well known that the dove is one 
of the most beautiful and one of the 
most harmless of birds, and yet the 
beauty of the bird may be greatly 
spoiled by smut. It is a striking pre- 
sentation of the thought of sin working 
ruin in a beautiful and pure life. Miss 
Whateley, in her book. Ragged Life in 
Egypt, tells us of the custom of the 

170 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

people and habit of birds which throws 
light upon the strong imagery of the 
text. 

Defiled Things 

In the East flat-roofed houses are 
very common. The flat roof is used for 
various purposes. It is a place of 
storage for such articles as are not 
desired to be seen by the visitor. 
Among the things most frequently put 
away after this manner are the pots and 
articles defiled by use. Of course, in a 
hot climate the birds seek relief from 
the heat in the shadow of any object 
within their reach. It was, therefore, a 
common thing for doves and other birds 
to find relief in midday by hiding 
among the pots on the flat roofs of the 
houses. Necessarily, though receiving 
a kind of protection, the birds came out 
with their beautiful plumage greatly 
despoiled by smut from the pots among 
which they had been resting. Then, in 
the early evening, as they flew forth in 
the light of the setting sun, their beauti- 
ful wings showed something of the tints 

of both silver and gold, only these were 

111 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

soiled by the presence of smut. This 
is used by the psalmist as a striking 
illustration of the effects of men living 
out of Christ in sin. The man who 
takes refuge in sin is just as sure to be 
soiled — morally and spiritually — as are 
the doves which take refuge from the 
sun's heat by resting among the pots. 
What is more beautiful than a clean 
dove ? On the other hand, what is more 
repulsive than a dove covered with 
smut? Here we get the contrast. A 
pure human character is the most beau- 
tiful thing in the universe, and the most 
repulsive is a life ruined by the filth 
of sin. 

The Loss of Beauty 

No bird can find rest among these 
smutty vessels except at the loss of its 
beauty, neither can a man trifle with 
sin except at the cost of his own peace 
and purity. The habits of the doves of 
the East find a parallel in the habits of 
men and women in all lands. Think 
of a beautiful bird spotted with the 
smut from the pots. Then think of men 
whose lives have become spotted 

172 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

by mixing in with idolatry, wrath, 
malice, strife, uncleanness, evil-speak- 
ing, hatred, slander, and social impur- 
ity. No bird can live among the smutty 
pots and keep itself unsoiled, neither can 
any man give himself over to these sins 
and maintain the beauty of Christian 
character, of life in Christ. No man 
can possibly live surrounded by sin, 
apart from grace, and escape the taint 
of these sins. The doves, though most 
lovely and beautiful among birds, can- 
not maintain their beauty, living among 
the pots, nor can men live in sin and 
maintain the purity of heart and the 
beauty of character to which they are 
called in Christ. 

II. The Unregenerate Man May Be 
Transformed From the Smut of Sin to 
the Purity of Grace, 

The blood of Christ works out of 
human character the stains of sin, and 
it works in the beauty of the divine life, 
transforming the life after the pattern 
given in the garden. As the doves com- 
ing from the flat-roofed houses in the 
East, stained by the smut from the pots, 

173 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

are transformed and made to shine in* 
the beauty of the sunshine reflected 
upon them, even so men coming* from 
the haunts of sin, with ruined lives, with 
a hopeless future, and coming into the 
light of the Sun of Righteousness, are 
redeemed and lifted up and made to 
show forth the gold of a Christlike life. 
How like the sunshine beautifying the 
soiled doves is the imputed righteous- 
ness of Christ, making a sin-cursed life 
resplendent with the beauty of the 
divine nature ! 

No Love for Sin 

No sin can be loved, or knowingly 
served, and yet enjoy the fulness of the 
Christ-life. When a man gives up his 
sin and takes a stand for God and truth, 
then the Sun of Righteousness makes 
him to shine forth as one of the 
redeemed of earth, a veritable child of 
God ! How striking is the picture ! How 
gracious is the thought ! How true are 
the facts! With such a reality before 
men, yet they choose to live among the 
pots of sin, tarnishing character and 

174 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

marring beauty, till hope is blighted and 
all is lost — lost forever ! 

Christ said, ''Come unto me all ye 
that labor and are heavy laden, and I 
will give you rest/' In every invitation 
to sinful man, a movement on his part 
must be required. He must come out 
from sin. Like as the birds flying in 
the light of the evening sun were made 
beautiful by coming out from the 
smutty pots into the light of the 
sun, so may the lives of men and women 
be transformed, changed from the smut 
of sin to the brightness and beauty of 
the Christ — be made to shine as though 
there had not been the smut of sin. 

Resistance of Unbelief 

This is a great mystery. Many men 
refuse to believe it. They refuse to 
believe that in Jesus Christ there can 
be this transformation of human char- 
acter. They are not slow to accept the 
idea that by upright living in them- 
selves they may make the transforma- 
tion, lifting them out of sin and into 
the light of a beautiful life. How easy 
it is to be deceived, to believe an error, 

175 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

and how hard it is to be sure you are 
right, to believe only the truth! Man 
can believe in his power to lift himself 
out of sin, and yet we know that all such 
efforts are vain, failures all of them! 
Whereas, on the other hand, men who 
have forsaken sin and come to Christ 
for the transforming power have been 
made new creatures in Him. Strange, 
indeed, it is that we have so much con- 
fidence in human strength, and so little 
confidence in the strength of the divine 
One. 

We can believe that clay and soot, 
with sand and water, can make a mud 
out of which the diamond is produced, 
and yet we cannot believe the greater 
truth that out of the smut of sin and 
ruin, God can lift human character into 
a likeness of Himself. Why is it that 
we can believe the one so readily, and 
cannot believe the other? The only 
explanation of this failure to believe 
God, while we believe so much in the 
power of man, may be found in the 
fact that our great adversary, the devil, 
endeavors to set us against faith in 
God, but does not care how much we 

176 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

believe of natural truth. God saves 
through Jesus Christ, but natural truth 
cannot lift a soul out of sin. Anything 
to despite God — anything to take from 
Him His glory, the devil will do, while 
he cares not one thing as to what we 
believe of truths which do not affect our 
salvation from sin. It does seem that 
any man who can believe that clay and 
soot and sand and water can be brought 
under any power that will transform 
them into the diamond, ought to be able 
to believe that the blood of Jesus Christ 
can cleanse from all sin and make men 
to be Christlike in their lives. 

Reflected Beauty 

The little dewdrop, catching the rays 
from the sun, reflects the beauty and 
glory of the sun — a reproduction in the 
tiny dewdrop of yonder's great King of 
Day. How was it done? The sun itself 
cast its ray of light into the dewdrop, 
and the dewdrop showed forth the glory 
of the sun. We can believe that, but 
when we are asked to believe that the 
light from the Sun of Righteousness can 
come into human life and transform 

177 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

it from smut to gold, we stop and refuse 
to believe it. No, if the King of Day 
has power to reproduce himself in a 
little dewdrop, surely the King of 
Righteousness can reproduce in us the 
likeness of Himself, and lead us forth 
from the ugly stains of sin into the glor- 
ious light of the beauty of God. 

In Holy Writ we are admonished 
again and again to take heed what we 
dOy what we know. May that not also 
include taking heed as to what we 
believe? With many it seems easy to 
believe if you see the moon in its first 
quarter over your left shoulder, you will 
be drenched with rain very soon, or if 
a rabbit crosses the road ahead of you, 
that you are doomed to an early portion 
of "bad luck," and a thousand other 
such nonsensical things, but if asked to 
believe that the blood of Jesus cleanses 
from all sin, at once these men begin to 
stumble — they cannot believe this amaz- 
ing fact. Why this difference? One 
has nothing in it, the other has salva- 
tion for the lost wrapped up in its 
hidden mystery. The natural man can 

178 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

believe a lie, but how hard for him to 
believe the truth ! By the blood of Jesus 
we may be changed from smut to gold 
— from sin to righteousness. 

"Would you be free from your burden of sin? 

There's power in the blood, 
Come for cleansing to Calvary's tide, 

There's wonderful power in the blood." 



179 



The acts of your life are like straws 
on a river. They show the course of 
your life. Some streams flow so swiftly 
that it is not necessary to throw objects 
upon them to see their course; others 
you must test in this way. Which way 
is your life? Can it be decided by those 
around you which way it is moving 
without testing it? If not, you have 
something to do. Do it. — W. W. Kap- 
nick. 




Elijah on Mount Carmel 



PURITY OF HEART 

The lighthouse-keeper's most difficult 
task is making his glasses clear on 
sleety nights when the ocean spray 
freezes upon them. The ship is some- 
where off in the storm. The light is 
clear within the tower. But if the glass 
of the lantern is allowed to groiv thick 
with ice the light is dimmed as it pours 
forth the sailor's help. Cleansing of 
heart and life are necessary for clear- 
ness of vision in spiritual things. The 
assurance of Christ is that the pure in 
heart are happy, for they shall see God. 
The vision of divine life is not given to 
eyes that are dimmed by gazing upon 
unclean things. The thoughts of the 
heart do not rise to God when they are 
bowed to earth by the pressure of 
impurity. The vision of God belongs to 
those who have kept themselves apart 
from evil for His sake. — Congregation- 
alist 



WITHOUT VISIONS OF TRUTH 
THE PEOPLE PERISH. 

''Earth may give darkness, 
But Heaven gives light." 

In Bible times the vision was a chosen 
means of communicating the thought of 
God to His people. It was no uncommon 
thing for God to speak to man, making 
known to him His will in its bearing 
upon his life and service. In modern 
times the idea of a vision seems to have 
fallen into disrepute. The man who 
would now claim to be taught of God in 
this way might be regarded as a fit sub- 
ject for the lunatic asylum, or be put 
down as a decided ignoramus. It may 
be well for us to remember, however, 
that all modern ideas are not necessarily 
correct, because modern. Let us not 
forget that in spite of man's deprecia- 
tion of the old-time visions it is still true 
that God can speak to man by visions. 
We mean to say, if a man, who is 
qualified to see visions, may be found, 
God can speak through him now, as well 

183 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

as in ancient times. There is a sense in 
which visions are just as essential to-day 
to the life of God's people, as they 
ever were. We may, or may not, have 
visions and dreams in the night-time, 
but the spiritually prepared man may 
have visions of truth given him in the 
study of the Word, and in his hours of 
meditation and prayer. Indeed, this is 
essential to the Christian life, for with- 
out visions of truth men cannot live 
spiritually. It was Solomon who said — 

"Where there is no vision, the people perish, 
but he that keepeth the law is happy." — 
Proverbs 29: 18. 

Visions of Truth 

Solomon had reference to visions of 
truth, of God's thought, as a means of 
nurturing and sustaining the divine 
life. Life and its development in divine 
things is dependent upon these visions 
of truth. The mind of man may be as 
truly impressed by the Spirit of God 
to-day as in any age of the world, if 
only the man's mind has been prepared 
for this privilege. 

In olden times God spoke by a vision 
to Abraham, to Jacob, to Isaiah, to 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Ezekiel, to Habakkuk, to Daniel, and to 
Mary, and others. In these visions. He 
has seen fit to reveal His richest 
thoughts, and His grandest purposes for 
the human family. When there is no 
vision the people perish. Sin may 
obscure the vision until life is choked 
out and men and women die from a lack 
of truth. It was so in Noah's times; 
sin so filled the hearts of the people that 
they lost sight of truth, and they not 
only perished in the flood, but perished 
spiritually. In the days of Eli there 
was no vision. People lost sight of the 
reality of truth and went forth to serve 
themselves after their own baser 
natures. There was a time of 450 years 
between the closing of the Old Testa- 
ment and the opening of the New, when 
there was no vision. Men did not speak 
for God, and the people went into dark- 
ness and sin. Men were so wrapped up 
in the things of the flesh that they com- 
pletely lost visions of truth, and dark- 
ness reigned for hundreds of years. 
Solomon says such an absence of truth 
brings death to the people — a sort of a 

185 . 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

spiritual famine in which the souls of 
men and women die for lack of suste- 
nance. 

Casting off Restraint 

The full meaning of the text comes out 
more clearly in the Revised Version, 
which says : 

^^ Where there is no vision, the people cast 
off restraint.'' 

When men lose sight of divine truth, 
they cast off restraint and rush headlong 
into ruin. 

Joseph Parker, the great London 
preacher of the latter part of the nine- 
teenth century, gives a very full and 
easy translation of this text, which is 
yet more expressive. He says its mean- 
ing is this : 

"Where tKere is no vision, the people go 
wild." 

We talk much of modern conditions. 
Is not the drift in human society to-day 
found in a wild rush for amusement and 
excitement, regardless of cost — a sure 
indication that they have lost the vision 
of truth? 

186 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Present-day Blindness 

It may be interesting and instructive 
to inquire : What is the vision spoken of 
in the text? The answer is vital in its 
bearings upon the human heart. The 
true answer is : A real vision is the out- 
come of communion with God, in which 
we get His thought, illuminated by His 
Spirit. Much of present-day blindness 
on the part of intelligent, cultured 
people is because they have no illumina- 
tion from the Spirit, and, therefore, 
though they see the literary beauties of 
the Word, they are unable to gain the 
precious truth which leads to life in 
Christ. 

But how may one expect to enjoy 
these visions ? Most truly by communion 
and fellowship with God. Truth creates 
the vision, and through it we come to 
know the thought and will of God. God 
in us is the very foundation of visions of 
truth. Indeed, without this illumina- 
tion, no man is wise enough to get a 
vision from God. The young man at 
Dothan was blinded so that he felt all 
was hopeless. The old prophet prayed 

187 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

God to let him see the great hosts round 
about them for their safety. His eyes 
were opened and he saw God's hosts pro- 
tecting them. Even David prayed for 
open eyes that he might see the truth, 
that he might have visions of God, and 
so live in the fulness of the divine life. 
The disciples' eyes were holden * so 
that they did not know Christ. And so 
it has been with many professing Chris- 
tians — they have failed to grasp the 
truth, and, as a result, they perish in 
sin. 

A Famine of Truth 

The truth of the text is demonstrated 
in the history of God's people. 

1. In the days of Eli we are told 
that there was a scarcity of the Word 
and no open vision. 

The one was a result of the other. 
Where the Word of God is well under- 
stood, there will be visions of truth. It 
is also true that the people went wild in 
the time of the Judges. Eli's sons were 
not alone. The multitudes lost the 



*Luke 24: 16. 

188 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

power of a vision of truth, and they 
went wild in sin. — 2 Sam. 3 : 11-14. 

2. In the days of Asa, Israel had 
long been without teaching. 

The result was they forgot God, and, 
forgetting God, they had no vision of 
truth. ^ 

3. In the days of Hosea, we are told 
that God's people were destroyed for 
lack of knowledge. - 

A thousand things are done in the 
name of religion, and for no better 
reason than ignorance. Ignorance is a 
shame for any people who have access 
to the Word of God. 

Arguing Against the Message 

4. In the days of Habakkuk, iniquity 
abounded. 

The people went wild in sin. ^ The 
old prophet was sent to give them warn- 
ing, but when he told them of their sins 
and of coming judgments, they argued 
against him, and refused to heed his 
warning. 

There are certain conditions upon 



' 2 Chron. 15: 3. ' Hosea 4: 6. ' Hab 1: 1-4. 

189 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

which rests the possibility of God's peo- 
ple enjoying these visions of truth. 

(1) The prayerful life. Communion 
with God is the open channel through 
which visions of truth are given. 

(2) The study of the Word of God 
must he faithful and honest. We must 
seek for all the fulness of God's light.^ 

(3) It is not enough to pray and to 
read the Word. We must actually turn 
away from all known sin. 

Why Truth Grasps the Heart 

Mark well this fact: When man, with 
enthusiasm, takes hold of the truth, the 
truth takes hold upon him, and the very 
thoughts of God burst in upon his heart 
and mind — and beget a new life. 

A man cannot have visions of things 
about which he has no concern. If he 
wishes a vision, revealing the thought 
of God, his mind must be centered upon 
the possibility. Columbus was the discov- 
erer of America, now one of the richest 
and most progressive countries in the 
world. But Columbus was a student of 
geography — he was wrapped up in the 

*Ps.36:9. 

190 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

possibilities of finding unknown lands, 
and as he studied, God gave him a vision 
of this great country. With this vision 
burning in his soul, he could not be at 
rest. Though many disappointments 
came to him, he pressed on, until, at 
last, he discovered America. It is plain 
enough to see that Columbus received a 
vision of the new world because he had 
prepared himself for it. 

The Hungry Heart 

This is a fair illustration of what may 
come in the life and thought of any 
Christian whose soul is stirred for the 
deeper truths of God's Word, whose 
heart is hungry for the fulness of His 
love, and whose highest purpose is to 
know and do God's will. Many of us are 
looking for a vision in our ignorance. 
Though we have the Word of God in our 
homes, we do not study it. Are we wait- 
ing for an angel to come and point out to 
us the riches of grace and the fulness of 
life? Alas! Such an one will wait in 
vain. If he would have visions of God, 
he must know God's Word, he must have 
communion with God, and he must have 

191 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

no other purpose in his heart than to do 
God's will. 

Unquestionably, the saddest aspect of 
Christian truth to-day is the fact that 
this kind of vision has so largely disap- 
peared, and the Church and her minis- 
try are seeking to live upon the husks 
of truth — having lost her vision of real 
truth in many important particulars. 

Lost Truths 

If I were asked to name some of these 
lost truths, I would say : 

The Church knows very little to-day, 
apparently, of the bitterness of sin. 
When men see their sins under the 
power of the Spirit's illumination, they 
will know the bitterness thereof. Our 
need is a clear vision of the bitterness 
of sin. 

Again, the Church of to-day needs a 
vision of her own spiritual impoverish- 
ment. She thinks she is rich, but she is 
indeed poor. * She has houses and lands 
and gold and silver, and great men and 
women, but has she a clear vision of 



Rev. 3 : 17, 18. 

192 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

God's revealed truth? Does she really 
know how poor she is in God's sight? 

Another truth v/hich the ChjLirch has 
lost in a large measure is the quickening 
of the Spirit. Are we not trying to 
make salvation largely an intellectual 
matter to-day? It is true the intellect 
has a great place in the visions God 
gives to His people, but the Spirit must 
quicken our thought, our imagination, 
our wills, our consciences, and awaken 
us to the real needs of the Christian life. 

A twofold truth, which seems practic- 
ally lost to the Church to-day, is the 
riches of grace, and the fruits of the 
Spirit, A poverty-stricken soul cannot 
bring forth large fruitage. Neither can 
a heart, perishing for the want of a 
vision of truth, grasp the great privi- 
leges which are in Christ Jesus. 

Another vision that has been very 
largely lost to the Church in recent 
times is holiness of heart, without which 
no man shall see God.f We are seeking 
now the wholeness of the intellect — its 
supremacy, but the intellect is poverty- 



t Heb. 12: 14. 

193 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

stricken, no matter what its accomplish- 
ments, until it is supported by a heart 
that is wholly given to God. 

The Danger of Officialism 

Even the ministry itself seems almost 
unable to command these visions of 
truth as gifts from God. We no longer 
feel keenly the need, and, as a result, our 
preaching is ofttimes fruitless, and the 
people are perishing for the want of 
truth. Sometimes the minister is 
afflicted with heart-blindness. He can- 
not see because the vision has disap- 
peared — because of his failure to study 
the full truths of God's Word. 

Is not the affliction of the ministry 
to-day officialism? We have come to 
regard our work, not so much as a 
calling as a profession^ a matter of 
the discharge of official duty. Love and 
power seem to have gone out, and we are 
at work simply as officials. In this 
sense, officialism is a curse to the minis 
try and a blight to the life of the Church. 
It dishonors God and dwarfs the Church 
of Christ. When there is no vision the 
people cast off restraint — go wild in 

194 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the enjoyment of the fleshly life. If the 
ministry will call the Church to a pray- 
erful study of the Bible, to a life of 
prayer, to the earnest service of God, 
both the ministry and the Church may 
yet see visions that shall bring life in 
all its fulness — newness of life which 
comes only from the life of God through 
Christ. 



195 



A CHEERFUL HEART 

^' 'He that is of a cheerful heart hath a 
continual feast,' .... Whether life to me 
is good and joyous and worth while does 
not depend half so much on what I have 
in my ^pocket as it does upon what I 

have in my heart The problem of 

living- happily and satisfactorily is not 
a problem of getting something, but a 
problem of becoming something. Life 
will take color and tone not from what 
I have, but from what I am. There are 
just as many people happy among those 
who haven't very big bank accounts as 
there are among the millionaires, just 
as many who find life a feast among 
those who eat very frugal fare as among 
those who luxuriate in over abundance,'' 



5 



^.J^Ji 



Visions of Truth 



HIS IMAGE 

''Remember, you cannot see both sides 
of the coin at once. When you are dis- 
couraged by the striving of the animal 
nature, and utterly disgusted ivith your- 
self and hating yourself as wholly unre- 
generate, the noblest exercise of your 
mental faculty is to force yourself to 
turn over the coin of yourself, and think 
intensely into the other side. Say: 'But 
I am the Lord's; His image is stamped 
on me. His life is in me; His eternal 
purpose is my perfection. My true ego 
is His divine Spirit.' '' 



WAIT— IT WILL PURELY COME. 

''And still from Him we turn away, 
And fill our hearts with worthless things." 

In the days of the long ago God often 
made known His thoughts through 
visions. To men and women whose 
hearts and minds were prepared to 
receive instruction, He spoke through 
the supernatural. In this way He 
rebuked sin and led His people to great 
victories. God rebuked Aaron and 
Miriam in a vision and taught Balaam 
the folly of his rashness. It was in a 
vision that He revealed to Isaiah the 
depth of his uncleanness. In a similar 
manner Paul was arrested, while perse- 
cuting the saints, and was converted. 
In a vision Peter was taught to call not 
that which God had cleansed common 
or unclean. To John on the Island of 
Patmos was given in a vision the great- 
est unfolding of human history in the 
Church of Christ that any man ever 
looked upon. These visions were always 
important. Sometimes they indicated 

199 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

coming judgment, and sometimes, com- 
ing glory. 

Waiting for the Vision 

We read in Habakkuk 2 : 2, 3— 

"And the Lord answered me, and said: 
Write the vision, and make it plain upon 
tables, that he may run that readeth it. For 
the vision is yet for an appointed time, but 
at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though 
it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely 
come, it will not tarry." 

In modern times we have almost 

ceased to look for the supernatural 

vision. The intellectual glow of the 

twentieth century seems to preclude the 

thought of God speaking to His people 

in this way. The change is in us, not in 

the Lord. No doubt He would speak to 

us now, if He could find the mind and 

heart ready to receive His instruction. 

The unprepared mind and heart are as 

surely shut to the visions of God as 

were the closed receivers of the wireless 

machine in mid-ocean on that fearful 

night in April, 1912, when for lack of 

a hearing ear the Titanic went to the 

bottom of the ocean, carrying with it 

1,600 souls. 

200 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Signal Calls not Heard 
On the ocean of time there have been 
many wrecks — there was no open ear to 
receive the signal calls, and all went 
down in ruin. It was so in Judah's 
history. In her sinful life God gave 
her warning through Habakkuk, but 
she was sin-deaf, she did not hear. 
There was one open heart and mind to 
receive it — it was Habakkuk. God had 
told him to tell Judah that because of 
her iniquity He would do a work 
among them in their days, but they 
would not believe it. Habakkuk's mes- 
sage to Judah was that He would raise 
up that bitter and hasty nation, the 
Chaldeans, that He would send them 
marching through their land to possess 
their dwelling-places, that they should 
come in violence, leaving destruction in 
their wake. Of course, Judah did not 
like that message, but they laughed at 
Habakkuk and called in question his 
authority. It is implied that they 
argued with the prophet to show that 
there was nothing in his message — they 
did not believe him at all. This mani- 

201 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

f estation of unbelief and resistance sent 

the old prophet to his place of prayer, as 

we read in the beginning of the second 

chapter, where he declared — 

"I will stand upon my watch, and set me 
upon the tower, and will watch to see what 
He will say unto (in) me, and what I shall 
answer when I am reproved'^ — or argued with. 

A Messenger of Mercy 

Habakkuk came to them as a mes- 
senger of mercy to give them warning 
and an opportunity to repent and so 
escape the threatened judgments, the 
invasion of the Chaldeans and the 
destruction of their country, but Judah 
would not believe — they spurned the 
messenger and his message, and con- 
tinued their carousals in sin. 

Habakkuk offended the people by tell- 
ing them the truth. That has often 
been the lot of the man sent to save. 
People do not like to be rebuked, or 
warned. They argued against Habak- 
kuk, utterly discrediting his message. 
When they denounced him and would 
not accept his message, the old prophet 
said, ''I know what I will do. I will 
go up and enter into my watch-tower 

202 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

and there I will tell the Lord how they 
have rejected His message of warning, 
and ridiculed His messenger." In a very 
short time he got an answer. The Lord 
said — 

"Write the vision, and make it plain upon 
tables, that he may run that readeth it, for 
the vision is yet for an appointed time, but 
at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though 
it tarry, v^ait for it: because it will surely 
come, it will not tarry." — Hab. 2:2, 3. 

Listening to the Inner Voice 
A very beautiful thought is wrapped 
up in the first verse of the second chap- 
ter. When the prophet went up into 
his watch-tower, he said : ''I will watch 
to see what He will say unto me." The 
English translation leaves the idea 
partly hidden, but the Hebrew brings 
it out. The prophet really said, ''I will 
watch to see what He will say, not unto 
me," but in me. He knew what it was 
to receive a message for others. He 
also knew what it was to receive a mes- 
sage for himself — inner communion 
with God, a veritable heart-message. 

No man ever lost finally by being true 
to God. Judah would not hear Habak- 
kuk, but God heard him and rewarded 

203 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

his faithfulness by giving him a vision 
of one of the greatest truths ever made 
known to man — a great comfort to the 
burdened prophet. We find the vision 
stated in plain language in verse four. 
'The just shall live by faith"— a 
blessed hope for all Christendom. It 
was given almost seven hundred years 
before it was fulfilled in the coming of 
Christ. Judah sought to dishonor 
Habakkuk by rejecting his message, but 
God exceedingly honored him, approv- 
ing his faithfulness and his courage by 
giving him a vision of a most precious 
truth — salvation by faith. 

Distant, but Coming 

God urged the prophet to wait for the 
vision. He said it is distant, but it will 
come at the appointed time. The vision 
was undoubtedly of the coming Christ 
and the salvation He was to bring. 
Here again our English translation 
leaves a great truth obscured, to say the 
least, declaring simply that "the just 
shall live by faith," but the Hebrew 
declares that by faith we shall live 
eternally — that is, in Jesus Christ. 

204 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

While the vision was distant, the 
prophet was fully assured that it would 
come on time, speaking, proclaiming a 
great message to men, the real import 
of which is largely lost in our English 
translation, but in the Hebrew the word 
s%)eak shines with divine splendor. It 
literally means one breathing or pant- 
ing, indicating one with an important 
message, delayed, but hurrying to make 
time, lest it come too late to serve its 
great purpose — panting for breath as 
from a long run. 

Waiting and Praying 

There is another important thought 
which appears only dimly in our 
English — the prophet was ordered to 
wait for the appointed time. That 
implies waiting in prayer — praying to 
be kept in harmony with God's thought 
and purpose, ready to receive the vision 
when given. Marconi's transmitter will 
not give a message to a receiver which 
is not adjusted to the transmitter. So 
waiting for the vision means waiting in 
prayer, in touch with the Spirit, quali- 
fied to receive the great truth, THE 

205 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH. The 

lack of harmony between man and God 
arises from two sources. They are : 

1. The Weakness, Ignorancey and 
Indifference of Man. These hinder a 
living union between the heart and God. 

2. The Devil, the Hinderer, Makes 
Every Possible Delay in Giving the 
Message of Truth, 

Satan a Hinderer 

This fact seems clearly set forth in 
the tenth chapter of Daniel, where the 
messenger who was sent by the Prince 
of the kingdom of Persia was delayed 
for twenty-one days, but when he did 
arrive, the first thing he did was to 
assure Daniel that his prayer had been 
heard from the first day that he set his 
heart to understand, chastening himself 
before God, and that though delayed, 
the answer was sure from the start. 
That Satan hinders God's messengers 
seems to be amply supported by the best 
evidence. Paul told the Thessalonian 
church that he would have come to them 
once and again, had not Satan hindered 
him. We know that Satan resisted 

206 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Joshua as he stood before the Lord. 
Then, too, Paul declared that he was not 
fighting with flesh and blood, but 
against principalities, against powers, 
against the rulers of the darkness of 
this world, against spiritual wickedness 
in high places. Knowing so well what 
all this resistance meant, Paul urged 
God's people not to cast away their con- 
fidence under trial— that after we have 
done the will of God, we may receive 
the reward. On the other hand, if we 
lose our confidence under trial, we 
destroy our own faith, the only channel 
through which God may come to us. 
Instead of giving up under trial, we 
need to betake ourselves to our place of 
prayer, as Habakkuk did, to see what 
He will say in us, as to His will and 
purpose. We need, when under trial, 
to talk with God, and this we cannot do 
to advantage in the hurly-burly of 
human society. We need to be alone 
with God in the hour of trial. 

Why the Answer Is Delayed 

Is there delay in God's answer to 
your prayers? Do not faint — remem- 

207 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

ber that God's answer is on the way. The 
messenger may be delayed, but he will 
come, panting as one hurried in a race, 
showing God's purpose to meet us as 
soon as we are ready to receive. Satan 
may hinder, but he cannot prevent, 
answer to prayer. The devil is mighty, 
but God is ALL MIGHTY. Let us consider 
the significance of this vision to the 
Church of Christ away off here in the 
twentieth century of the Christian Era. 

Habakkuk in his thought that God 
would speak in him clearly points to the 
inner consciousness under divine com- 
munication — a privilege which was to 
accompany the giving of the vision of 
living by faith. Jesus evidently had 
such a thought in mind when He said : 

"He that loveth me shall be loved of my 
Father, and I will love him, and will manifest 
myself to him." 

Love has three links, one for the 
Father, one for His Son, one for man. 

A little later Jesus also declared : 

"And the glory which Thou gavest me I 
have given them." 

208 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

Manifestation of the Divine Presence 

What is this manifestation but the 
consciousness of fellowship with Him, 
and what is this glory which He had 
with the Father, but the inner revela- 
tions of divine truth, given to believers 
for inner enrichment by faith? In this 
manifestation of the divine Presence 
the believer finds spiritual enlargement 
and gets a clearer insight into truths of 
the inner life, after the divine pattern 
— a life each one must get and main- 
tain for himself through communion 
with God. 

It is easy to give up seeking the riches 
of grace, but if we are to get the vision, 
there must be no let-up till we find the 
fulness of blessing. 

Astronomers have discovered worlds 
out in space. They did that with the 
telescope, but the telescope is super- 
seded — another method now leads the 
astronomer out into the fields of light — 
the use of the camera. Photographic 
films are exposed to the starlight of the 
heavens through the darkness of the 
night, when the very space of worlds is 

209 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

photographed, revealing the presence 
and splendors of the infinite spaces 
of the universe — worlds beyond are 
brought very nigh. 

In the Realms of Spiritual Light 

This wonderful discovery has its 
counterpart in the realms of spiritual 
light. Using the telescope of his intel- 
lect, man has surveyed the fields of 
divine truth, finding here and there a 
world lighted. Let him cease from man, 
and looking beyond, let him grasp the 
light which the Spirit offers. 

The believer who will open his heart 
and mind in the darkness of this world 
to the incoming light of the Holy Spirit 
shall receive such revelations of divine 
truth as shall qualify him to enter into 
the fulness of life in Christ. Paul 
explained what this means when he said 
only the Spirit-taught person can 
understand Spirit-taught truths. 

The very name of Habakkuk hints at 
the method of making these larger gains 
in the divine life. His name means 
''the strong embrace of God.'' What a 
picture of the true Christian life — 

210 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

caught up into the strong embrace of 
God and kept for service or for sacri- 
fice! Let us, when passing through 
hard places, go into the watch-tower, 
the secret place of prayer, and there, 
in the strong embrace of God, wait to 
see what He will say in us, as indicat- 
ing His will concerning us. Here let us 
rest in faith. 



211 



GOD UNDERSTANDS 

"It is so sweet to knoWy 

When we are tired and when the hand 
of pain 

Lies on our hearts, and when we look in 
vain 

For human comfort, that the heart di- 
vine 

Still understands these cares, both yours 
and mine: 

''Not only understands, but, day by day. 
Lives with us while ive tread the earthly 

way; 
Bears with us all our weariness, and 

feels 
The shadows of the faintest cloud that 

steals 
Across our sunshine; ever learns again 
The depth and bitterness of human 

pain, 

''There is no sorrow that He will not 

share. 
No cross, no burden, for our hearts to 

bear 
Without His help, no care of ours too 

small 
To cast on Jesus: let us tell Him all — 
Lay at His feet the story of our woes, 
And in His sympathy find sweet repose/' 




COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY PROVIDENCE LITHOGRAPH w.. 

The Coming of Light 



TWO PRAYERS 

^'One cried in earnest, pleading prayer: 

'Lord, take the burdens from my 
heart; 
Lift from my brow its crotvn of care, 

Take from the rose its stinging smart. 
Choose not the lonely, rugged way 

By dark Gethsemane for me; 
But lead me gently, day by day. 

In pleasant pathways up to Thee!' 

''Another voiced his soul in prayer: 

'Lord, take no burdens that are best; 
For while my brow is worn with care, 

My spirit finds in Thee sweet rest. 
Some souls but dimly see the light. 

Let me their loving helper be; 
And give me strength to climb the 
height 

That leads at last to love and Thee!' 

"One lost his burdens, and repined 

In idleness, unloved, and unsought. 
And learned the rose with thorn en- 
twined 

Is sweeter than to cherish naught. 
One found in duty highest meed, 

While unseen angels near him trod; 
An almoner for souls in need, 

He passed through human love to 
God:' 



A FOURFOLD VIEW OP CHRIST 
AND HIS CHURCH AS FORE- 
SHADOWED IN OLD TES- 
TAMENT PARABLES. 

"As the light of the morning, even a morning 
without clouds." 

While the Old Testament deals 
largely with the people of God before 
Christ was manifested in the flesh, yet 
through types and shadows and mir- 
acles and parables, it has much to say 
of His coming and of the work of His 
Church. In this way we get early fore- 
gleams of the coming light of the Chris- 
tian Dispensation. 

Indeed, prophetic utterances were 
largely devoted to the character of 
Christ and His Church. Throughout 
the Old Testament we find here a type 
and there a shadow, here a parable and 
there a miracle, each in its own peculiar 
way revealing the Son of God going 
forth to war in the Church as His 
chariot of conquest. Let us look into 

215 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

a few of these, as more clearly showing 
the mission of the Church and the scope 
of its great work. 

A Child's Wise Answer 
A child was asked, What is a parable? 
She answered : ''A parable is an earthly 
story with a heavenly meaning/' 

That answer is full of thought. A 
theologian might not accept it, but it is 
doubtful if he could give a better 
answer. Turning to our task, let us 
study — 

I. The Lost Equipment. 

"And the iron did swim." — 2 Kings 6: 6. 

God Himself did not despise the day 
of small things, neither should His 
people. We have the bursting bud, the 
opening bloom, the growing, and then 
the ripening, fruit. 

Elisha and his disciples had made a 
beginning for a school of the prophets. 
Of course it was crude, but it was the 
center of their activities and the scene 
of their growth. Their numbers had 
increased till the enlargement of their 
plant became a necessity. Some of the 

216 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

students, appreciating the need of 

larger quarters, said to Elisha : 

"Behold the place where we dwell with thee 
is too strait (small) for us. Let us go, we 
pray thee, unto Jordan and take thence every 
man a beam, and let us make a place where 
we may dwell." — 2 Kings 6: 12. 

Elisha, recognizing the need, readily 
agreed to the proposition, and went 
with the young men in search of the 
timber. By the Jordan, they began fell- 
ing trees for the enlargement of the 
school building. In a short time one of 
the young men quit work, not of choice, 
but because he had lost his equipment — 
his axe-head came off and fell into the 
water beyond his reach. He cried out : 

"Alas, master, for it was borrowed!" 
Recovering the Lost Equipment 

Elisha asked the young man to point 
out to him the place where the axe- 
head sunk into the water. He did so. 
Then the old prophet cut a stick and 
cast it into the water where the axe had 
fallen. Immediately ''the iron did 
swim," and as it came in sight the 
prophet said to the young man : "Take 
it up to thee!'' 

217 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

The young man put out his hand, 
took the swimming iron, delighted with 
its restoration. In the first place, the 
axe was borrowed ; in the second place, 
without it he could not fell trees for the 
new school-building. No wonder he was 
distressed, for without his equipment he 
was useless. From this incident we 
may learn a practical lesson in Chris- 
tian service, viz. : 

The swimming iron is expressive of 
the character and work of the minister 
and the Church among men. 

The restoration of the borrowed axe 
to the young laborer was clearly a mir- 
acle God worked through the prophet. 
No human agency can make iron swim. 
This incident gives us a striking por- 
trait of the individual, equipped and 
not equipped, for service. Though it 
was a borrowed one, yet while the young 
man had his axe, he was equipped for 
the work in hand, but when the axe 
went to the bottom of the Jordan, the 
young workman could not longer work. 
Think of a man trying to fell a tree with 
an axe-handle — absurd, but no more so 

218 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

than is a Christian at work, trying to 
lead men to Christ for salvation, while 
he himself has not the gift of the Holy- 
Spirit. The axe was no more necessary 
to the success of the young man's labors 
than is the gift of the Spirit for the real 
success of the Christian worker in win- 
ning souls to Christ. 

The Daring of Unbelief Is Amazing! 
In an effort to dispense with the mirac- 
ulous, some men have dared to say that 
Elisha pushed a piece of wood under- 
neath the axe-head and so lifted it out 
of the water. Another class of would- 
be critics declares that Elisha thrust a 
stick in the hole in the axe-head and so 
pulled it out. How puerile ! If there had 
been no miracle in it all, the incident 
would never have come to us as of any 
consequence. Alas, for man's unbelief ! 
How humiliating it is to see a man crit- 
icising his Maker! It would be just as 
sensible to deny that the heat of the sun 
has anything to do with the germina- 
tion of life in a seed, as to deny miracles 
as the legitimate outcome of the power 
of God. 

219 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

A Borrowed Axe 

The borrowed axe is suggestive. The 
lost axe is distressing. The recovered 
axe is an intimation of new service, and 
therefore a new joy in the life. Is not 
the Christian's equipment for service 
always borrowed? May it not be lost? 
In that event, he is as helpless as was 
the young man without his axe. As the 
young man's equipment was loaned to 
him for service, so is the Christian's 
equipment — ^the gift of the Spirit — 
loaned to him as an enduement for 
service. The young man's loss ended 
his usefulness. It is every whit as true 
of the Christian in service — ^he can 
serve successfully only so long as he is 
under the power of the Spirit. The loss 
of the Spirit is the loss of usefulness. 
Christ confirms this view, for He said : 

''Without me ye can do nothing." 
The young man did not try to cut 
another beam after he had lost his axe 
— how could he? In this he showed 
good sense. A blessing indeed would it 
be, if when we lose our divine equip- 
ment we would spend no more time in 

220 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

an effort to do the work, but rather give 
the whole attention to regaining our 
equipment, as this young man did. 

Sad, Indeed! 
What is sadder than to see a preacher 
trying to preach the gospel when his 
power is gone — when the Holy Spirit 
has been grieved to the point of leaving 
the preacher to struggle alone? It is 
only a poor excuse for trying to render 
an impossible service. We doubt not it 
makes the devil and all of his imps 
laugh to see such an effort. The devil 
never fears the Christian who labors 
without his equipment, the gift of the 
Spirit. May the success of the young 
man with his axe, and his failure with- 
out it, ever be a reminder to the Chris- 
tian worker of the certainty of failure, 
if his equipment is lost. The secret of 
the success of the new building for 
Elisha's college was in the fact that 
they followed God and obeyed Him— 
that is always the secret of true success 
in the Church. 

221 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

II. The Flowing and Deepening 
River. 

"And everything shall live whither the river 
Cometh." — Ezek. 47: 9. 

Ezekiel's vision of the holy waters! 
How marvelous ! What a picture of the 
Holy Spirit flowing through the Church 
to the ends of the earth, giving life to 
everything it touches. Issuing from 
beneath the temple eastward, deepening 
and spreading as it flowed, the waters 
became a river that could not be passed 
over — a river to swim in, picturing 
blessed revelry in the fulness of the 
Spirit-fllled life. 

A deep and overflowing river is 
expressive of the fulness and power of 
the spiritual life of the Church of 
Christ. 

The River Lined With Fruit-bearing Trees 

Looking to the banks of the river, 
Ezekiel saw them lined with trees, bear- 
ing fruit for food and leaves for 
medicine. The river itself was life- 
giving — everything it touched lived, 
just as vegetation lives where the 
stream of water spreads — so spiritually, 

222 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

whatever is touched by the River of God 
lives and flourishes and blooms and 
fruits. This river flowed through a dry 
country, but it put everything to its best 
— new life, new foliage, new fruitage, 
and a wonderful harvest ! Not only did 
the river flow through a dry country, 
but it flowed into a sea of death. Noth- 
ing could live in the Dead Sea, but the 
emptying of these waters into that hole 
of poison, healed its waters, and forth- 
with fish lived in its depths. What a 
picture the Dead Sea gives us ! Full of 
death by its own strength, meantime the 
river Jordan was pouring its fresh 
waters into its great basin, as if to 
destroy its death-dealing power by 
constantly flooding it with fresh water, 
but in vain! And yet the moment the 
holy waters began to pour into its 
depths, that moment its deadly waters 
were healed, and whatever sought to 
make a home therein found, not death, 
as heretofore, but life and growth and 
fruitfulness. 

223 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 
A Symbol of a Dead Church 

What a picture of a dead church was 
the Dead Sea! Human goodness is 
poured into the dead church, much as 
the Jordan poured its fresh waters into 
this sea of death, only to find nothing 
had been accomplished — t he fresh 
waters speedily became salty and no 
fruit, but death, appeared. When the 
river of holy waters began to pour into 
the Dead Sea, its waters were healed. So 
when the River of God begins to pour 
its living waters into a dead church, 
forthwith it begins to live and pour out 
its blessings upon humanity. Only the 
power of God can turn death into life, 
and only He can make life as a fruitful 
vine. 

Again this Dead Sea is a fit symbol of 
the world, dead in trespasses and sin. 

The river Jordan pouring its waters 
into its depths may represent the 
teachers, philosophers, philanthropists, 
humanitarianists, and merchant princes 
who pour their treasures into the lap 
of human want, but spiritually in vain ! 
All of these combine^ cannot give life 

224 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

to the great sea of humanity — cannot 
bring the much-sought-f or uplift of men 
and women to this living life. It takes 
the power of God to accomplish such an 
end — when He sends the holy waters to 
flood the dry and perishing peoples, 
then everything these waters touch, 
lives, buds, leaves, blooms, and fruits, 
all bringing a glorious harvest in the 
salvation of the lost. 

A Symbol of a Spreading Gospel 

Note also the rapid increase in the 
depth and breadth of the river. 

First it rose to the ankles, then to the 
knees, then to the loins, and then it was 
a river that one could not pass over, 
so deep and wide. A beautiful symbol 
of the River of God as the Gospel 
Stream, flowing from nation to nation 
till it reaches the ends of the world, and 
the beauty of its power is the fact that 
wherever it touches, life is imparted, 
and men and women come to know the 
Lord. How wonderful has been the 
progress of this mighty onflowing 
river ! EzekieFs vision, beginning ankle 
deep, swept on and on, deepening and 

225 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

broadening, till one could not pass over 
it, but could swim in it. Beginning 
anew in the days of Christ with a few 
unlearned fishermen, this marvelous 
stream swept on beyond the Jews and 
took in the Gentiles, then through Asia 
Minor, Greece, the continents of 
Europe, the isles of the sea, and the 
western world, and now its tide is 
returning and spreading, through mis- 
sionary effort, in Palestine, in China, in 
Africa, in India, and in South America, 
and to the uttermost parts of the earth. 
It is the glorious gift of the glorious 
Christ to a fallen world ! 

III. In the Enclosed Garden and 
THE Sealed Fountain. 

"A garden inclosed is my sister, my spouse; 
a spring shut up, a fountain sealed." — Song of 
Solomon 4: 12. 

The tender lover, speaking of his bride- 
elect, compares her to a closed garden, 
to a sealed fountain! How expressive 
are these comparisons! They present 
at once the ideal of the true Church — 
the enclosed garden keeps all enemies 
away from the tender and beautiful 
plants and flowers. The sealed foun- 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

tain is the symbol of purity within, no 
poison, no filth can enter there to spoil 
its sweetness ! 

The enclosed garden is expressive of 
the separated life of the Church and 
the sealed fountain of its purity in 
doctrine and practice. 

Shielded From the Blight of Sin 

We are here taught in these figures 
that God puts Himself round about His 
people to preserve their character, 
beauty, and fruitfulness from the 
blighting touch of sin. Elsewhere He 
represents Himself as a wall of fire, 
protecting His own from the curse of 
sin. Satan must not be allowed the 
privilege of the garden, or the sealed 
fountain. Each of these figures seems 
to stand out, and in a way that cannot 
be misunderstood, proclaiming the sep- 
aration of the Church from the unholy 
and impure things of the world. 

Again, keeping up the figure of the. 

garden, the Lover tells His Bride of the 

plenty that shall crown her life — 

'*Thy plants are as an orchard of pome- 
granates, with pleasant fruits.'' — Song of Solo- 
mon 4: 13. 

227 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

How beautiful are these figures! 
How expressive of the blood-bought 
relationship of the Church to her Lord ! 
The Church is a spiritual garden, nour- 
ishing tender plants, and bringing forth 
the sweetest flowers and richest fruits 
of the divine life. The Church can 
never be all of this till she is separated 
from the world — ^the Spirit of our God 
must enclose her as a fence encloses a 
garden, or as a wall, the fountain, keep- 
ing her from mingling in the ways of 
death and spiritual ruin. Enclosed, 
sealed by the Spirit, the Church is at 
once a mighty power in the hands of 
our God, but exposed to the invasion of 
the world with its poison and ruin, she 
is helpless and undone ! 

iV. In the Candlestick All of 
Gold. 

"Behold a candlestick all of gold." — Zech. 
4:2. 

How beautiful are the thoughts of 
God! How expressive is the language 
of inspiration ! Every type, figure, par- 
able, and symbol seems to overflow with 
the fulness of God, and yet these are 

228 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

given to us so simply that the finite 
mind may grasp them under the illumi- 
nation of the Spirit. Every word of 
God seems weighted with precious 
thought — -food for the hungry soul. 

The candlestick all of gold is expres- 
sive of the character and service of the 
Church in its highest state of spiritual 
development in the earthly life. 

Light Givers 

The candlestick all of gold is expres- 
sive of the light-giving character of 
Christ as He stands in the midst of His 
Church, leading the way to its highest 
state of spiritual development. 

In Zechariah's vision of the candle- 
stick there was no alloy — it was all of 
gold, giving out the pure light as from 
the face of the Sun of Righteousness. 
Gold is a symbol of Christ, but the 
golden candlestick, equipped with the 
bowls and oil, its seven lamps and its 
seven pipes, at once suggests the 
thought of Christ in the midst of the 
Church and through it giving light to 
the world. This interpretation seems 
fully justified by the interpretation 

229 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

given to the candlesticks in Rev. 1 : 20, 
where it is definitely stated that the 
candlesticks are the seven churches. 
God thus foreshadows His purpose to 
give His Church light that it may know 
the ways of truth and righteousness and 
walk therein. Godlessness means dark- 
ness. On the other hand, in the light of 
God we shall see light^ and walk with 
Him in its noonday splendor. The 
reason the Church does not live a pure 
and fruitful life is because she does not 
live in the light of God. Purity is God's 
ideal for the Church. He will not give 
her to His Son, as His Bride, till she is 
pure. To contend otherwise is to put 
God's ideal below that of man's, for no 
man wants a bride who is not pure and 
beautiful in life and character. Can 
God be satisfied with less? 

Is Such a Life Possible? 
Many are holding that the Church of 
Christ can never realize such a life on 
this earth. They believe it is too weak 
— that it has too many enemies lurking 
on its pathway, seeking its ruin, to per- 



^Psa. 36:9; Psa. 139:11; Zech. 14:7. 

230 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

mit it ever to reach such an ideal as God 
has marked out for it. But that view 
comes as the result of magnifying 
human strength and minifying the 
divine power. If we correctly read the 
promises of God, such a day is coming. 
It may be near, or it may be far, but it 
is coming — must come. God means that 
His Church shall be the spotless Bride 
of Christ. If she be not that, it will be 
because the Church refuses the dis- 
cipline necessary to bring her forth as 
the gold that is tried in fire. 

Even in the New Testament we are 
taught that Christ gave Himself for the 
Church, that it might be a glorious 
Church, not having a spot or wrinkle, or 
any such thing, that He might sanctify 
it and present it to Himself a glorious 
Church without a blemish.^ That is the 
divine ideal to which God calls individ- 
ual believers to come. 

Shall Christ Have an Impure Bride? 

Purity is Christ's own thought of His 
own blood-bought Church. To dispute 
it is to discredit Christ's own conception 



'Eph. 5: 25-27. 

231 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

of His finished work. That is sin, rank 
unbelief! Rather let us magnify His 
power to save and to keep to the utter- 
most. Men are saying such a Church 
in this world is impossible. But did not 
Jesus say: "With God all things are 
possible?'' And shall we not believe 
Him? Surely God can, and will, give 
a pure Church as a beautiful Bride to 
His Son. An impure Church can never 
fill the place of the Bride of Christ! 

It is little short of the marvelous to 
see what men can believe as to the pos- 
sibilities of the power of man. It is no 
less marvelous to see how little faith 
men have in the power of God to work 
wonders in the salvation of man. We 
find no trouble to believe that the 
human voice can be heard thousands of 
miles away by the help of the wireless 
telephone, or that the eye can be given 
strength by the help of the telescope to 
grasp the location, distance, size, and 
appearance of the stars and the heav- 
enly bodies, or that weak water can be 
transformed into steam and so become 
one of the mightiest powers in the 

232 



THE OLD TESTAMENT 

world; or we can believe that man can 
actually fly like a bird of the air, by the 
assistance of the aeroplane ; or, that the 
ingenuity of man can devise a light with 
such penetrating power as. to permit us 
to see through solid bodies, even through 
iron itself, or to see the bones in our 
own bodies, and without damage, and 
yet we cannot believe that God can give 
to His Son as His bride a spiritually 
pure Church! 

Is Your Faith in God or Man? 

Alas, for the power and the weakness 
of faith ! We have mighty faith in the 
power and skill of men, but so little 
faith in the power and skill of God. 
The twofold nature of faith is a great 
mystery. With some people faith has 
wonderful power to believe in man, but 
a staggering incredulity when it comes 
to believing God for the working of 
great wonders in the spiritual realm. 
Men lean upon knowledge rather than 
faith, as if knowledge were a mightier 
implement of human achievement. We 
seem not to know that faith is the con- 
tinuation of knowledge — a leap beyond 

233 



GARDEN SPOTS IN 

knowledge into the arms of God. Why 
this freak of faith ? If through natural 
law such wonders can be accomplished, 
why not believe that God can and will 
do greater things in the spiritual realm? 
Is it not because our adversary, Satan, 
the disputer of this world, hinders our 
faith? He does not object to man's 
faith in history, science, and philosophy. 
It is only when man believes in God's 
way of saving to the uttermost, that the 
wicked one contests every inch of prog- 
ress the believer makes. Believing is 
the mighty link between God and man. 

'Through a dark and stormy night 
Faith holds a steady light — 
Up the blackness streaking; 
Knowing God's own time is best, 
In patient hope I rest 
For the full day-breaking." 



234 




Hope 



OLD TESTAMENT BOOKS 

''In Genesis the world was made 

By God's creative hand, 
In Exodus the Hebrews marched 

To gain the promised land. 
Leviticus contains the law, 

Holy and just and good; 
Numbers records the tribes enrolled. 

All sons of Abraham's blood. 
Moses, in Deuteronomy, 

Records God's mighty deeds; 
Brave Joshua into Canaan's land 

The host of Israel leads. 
In Judges their rebellion oft 

Provokes the Lord to smite; 
But Ruth records the faith of one 

Well pleasing in His sight. 
In First and Second Samuel 

Of Jesse's son we read. 
Ten ti'ibes in First and Second Kings 

Revolted from his seed. 
The First and Second Chronicles 

See Judah captive made; 
But Ezra leads a remnant back 

By princely Cyrus' aid. 
The city walls of Zion 

Nehemiah builds again, 
Whilst Esther saves her people 

From plots of wicked men. 
In Job we read how faith will live 

Beneath affliction's rod, 
And David's Psalms are precious songs 

To every child of God. 
The Proverbs, like a goodly string 

Of choicest pearls, appear. 



Ecclesiastes teaches man 

How vain are all things here. 
The mystic Song of Solomon 

Extols sweet Sharon's rose, 
While Christ, the Savior and the King, 

The rapt Isaiah shows. 
The warning Jeremiah 

Apostate Israel scorns, 
His plaintive Lamentations 

Their awful downfall mourns. 
Ezekiel tells in wondrous words 

Of dazzling mysteries. 
Whilst kings and empires yet to come 

Daniel in vision sees. 
Of judgment and of mercy 

Hosea loves to tell. 
Joel describes the blessed days 

When God with man shall dwell. 
Among Tekoa's herdsmen 

Amos received his call. 
Whilst Obadiah prophesies 

Of Edom's final fall. 
Jonah enshrines a wondrous type 

Of Christ our risen Lord, 
Mieah pronounces Judah lost, 

Lost, but again restored. 
Nahum declares on Nineveh 

Just judgment shall be poured. 
A view of Chaldea's coming doom 

Habakkuk's visions give. 
Next Zephaniah warns the Jews 

To turn, repent, and live. 
Haggai wrote to those who saw 

The Temple built again. 
And Zechariah prophesied 

Of Christ's triumphant reign. 
While Malachi, with garments rent, 

Concludes the Ancient Testament." 



GOD SAVE THE PEOPLE 

When wilt Thou save the people? 

God of mercy, when? 
Not kings and lords, but nation^! 

Not thrones and crowns, but men! 
FlowWs of Thy heart, God, are they; 
Let them not pass, like weeds, away! 
Their heritage a sunless day. 
God save the people! 

Shall crime bring crime forever. 
Strength aiding still the strong? 

Is it Thy will, Father, 

That man shall toil for wrong? 

No! say Thy mountains; No! Thy skies; 

Man's clouded sun shall brightly rise. 

And songs ascend instead of sighs. 
God save the people! 

When wilt Thou save the people? 

God of mercy, when ? 
The people. Lord, the people: 

Not thrones and crowns, but men! 
God, save the people; Thine they are. 
Thy children, as thine angels fair. 
From vice, oppression, and despair 
God save the people! 

— Ebenezer Elliott. 




022 208 245 6 



